In the calm of night
A queer voice broke the silence
I woke up from dream,
A mournful song from downstairs
In quiet night, caged bird sings.
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Image Courtesy: Google Image
Rain, fog and Sun
In rain, these flowers looked magical.
In these past days when one after another, rain, fog and sun appeared, this week for me has become memorable.
On Monday evening, it rained.
Weather was so pleasant on that day that I who normally hate getting wet in rain, asked my niece to come and join me outside.
A puddle was formed on street and I didn’t mind standing in it.
Water found its way inside my sneakers and my socks got wet.
At that moment, I looked at my niece who was enjoying playing with leaf in water, she was considering it a boat.
On seeing that, I decided to enjoy the moment anyway and allowed water to find more ways to wet my socks.
Reflection of trees in water on street looked beautiful.
Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were cold and foggy days. They didn’t allow us to explore much outside.
Even this Saturday morning there was fog in sky but later sun appeared with all its might.
Under the canopy of yellow shine, earth got warm and calm today.
This is an outside view of library. While taking this picture, I inhaled the sweet fragrance of yellow flowers in air.
Sitting in a park observing shades of sunlight on grass, I thought how different facets of Mother Nature has successfully allowed themselves to fuse in a single week.
When it rained, it was cool.
When there was fog, driving was difficult and today with the sprinkle of golden sunshine on earth, each and everything regained its lost vigour.
Divinity in its might is kind and diverse, It has many colors. If a certain day is dull than a next day can become fun.
Brilliant integration of fog, rain and sun has made this week beautiful for me.
Even Jack and Jill while fetching water from well were also looking happy today.
Word of the day: Integrated
Circle of life
This picture is of my third birthday. Lots of memories are associated with it and more than anything else it reminds me of an old reel camera which these days is placed in drawer of my store.
On my this birthday
When we all sit together
Gentle reminder,
Of cherishing a moment
That family made special.
Birthdays are different now but parents know how to make them special. Yesterday, my mother baked this cake for me.
This post is in response to Colleen’s weekly Tanka poetry challenge.
Theme: Circle of Life
I wander lonely as a cloud
Writers are like thieves, they like to get inspire by their environment.
Sometimes they simply steal ideas.
Like WordsWorth in Daffodils who wanders lonely as a cloud. Today, I too allowed myself to become a cloud.
In the glittering shine of calm January Sun, I was feeling light-hearted and considering myself in a WordsWorth’s world, I took a chance to wander and appreciate my surrounding.
It all started with the arrival of Rofus Treepie in home today.
This Indian Treepie who belongs to crow family likes to come at the time in morning when there’s still darkness in sky.
Birds are early riser but this specific bird wakes way too early.
While going to park, I took this picture.
There’s something special about different shades of green in it.
Leaves are yellow, they’re of dark green colour and they appear light green and when the sun is allowing them to make shadows on ground, I like the leafiness of those trees in background.
Under this bridge is a way for a small stream to flow.
In winter there’s no water in it but when there’ll be summer, the coolness of water and kindness of trees will provide much needed relief to a wanderer standing on this bridge beneath these trees.
After bleak winter days, sun sprinkled it’s glitter on earth today.
Standing in my yard, when I heard chirping of birds up in a tree, I can’t help remembring these words by Hellen Keller
“The best and the most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched_they must be felt by a heart.”
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This post is in response to ragtag daily prompt wander.
Indian treepie bird courtesy:
Google Image.
Sunshine
I crave for warm sun
After a stormy winter
Shine fills heart with glee.
My student is making progress.
When mother of my six year old student initially came, she was worried about her kid who was reluctant to write with her.
Her son was enjoying doing reading at home. He could answer comprehension questions well but when it came to writing, he simply refused to express his thoughts.
Mother wanted my help and I was eager to try.
On first day, before starting our class, I took him to window and asked him to explain what he was seeing outside, he replied that the grass was green and the sky was blue with white fluffy clouds in it.
It was our warm-up session. After he did reading from manual, I encouraged him to move toward workbook and worksheets.
At first, he got confused because I was asking him to do something which was a least favourite thing for him.
In order to show my love for him, I gave him a quick hug which brought smile on his face. Later, I asked him to give me a high-five so that I could check his energy level.
He liked that activity.
Before start of the class when I was going through this worksheet, I prepared some questions that could help him in writing better about picture but it didn’t require much effort on my part as being a kid, he loved imagining what was going on in a house and wrote about a person who was sleeping in it.
This, I’m poem he composed is lovely and close to my heart.
I’m happy that my student is enjoying doing writing with me.
I’m small and my age is six.
I wonder why the sun is shiny?
I hear your secret.
I see a walking monster.
I want a new pencil box.
I’m small and my age is six.
I pretend to be a spider man.
I feel hot.
I touch pencil.
I worry that shopkeeper won’t give me a bat.
I cry when my sister hits me.
I’m small and my age is six.
Eating habits of birds in my home
This black-rumped flameback is a guest of winter in my home.
Outside on the wall of my home, three clay pots are placed. Two out of three hold bird seeds while the third one which is placed right in front of kitchen window remains full of food which comes straight from stove.
With the exception of doves and pigeons; myneahs, starlings, sparrows, crows and bulbul all love to eat bread.
Rice is a favorite staple food of birds and it has become a common norm in home that whatever is cooking in the form of rice, before going to dining table, first goes straight outside in that pot above the wall.
Glass of the windows are such that we can observe the birds outside but a bird sitting near the window is only able to see its reflection in it.
It happens that whenever food gets finish, birds make different types of sounds.
With time we have learned to discern these voices.
When hungry, they make short sounds. When need help from cat, they sound excited and their voices are shrill. When they like food, their sound is soft and happy.
At times, they come near the kitchen window and look inside as if they’re in search of extinct food.
Crows and Starlings waste bread and seeds but squirrels are careful to pick every tiny bit of food from floor and wall.
Watching squirrels eating food is a delightful experience.
When they’re eating, sometimes they put one foot in pot while their other foot is down on the wall and in such funny pose, they like to eat with great attention.
These last days of January are cold and foggy.
Birds are finding little to no food and they’re coming in large number to eat. So, it happens that when I put crush bread slices outside, the pot gets empty in no time.
This post is in response to RDP Saturday: Extinct
Rainy Monday morning.
This morning my alarm was supposed to go off at five thirty but something went wrong with the settings but I was lucky to leave my bed at six due to sound of falling drops of rain on the cover of washing machine outside.
It kept on raining for six hours today.
Ten in the morning was my scheduled interview for the post of an ESL teacher. Before the start of an interview, I was bit nervous but the voice of interviewer was soft and it made me feel comfortable.
I can’t help mentioning Murphey’s law here, I’m not a believer in it but somehow at eleventh hour despite prior preparations, my laptop and headset started creating problem for me.
The interviewer was nice.
She gave me time and with positive approach, I was able to reach her and enjoyed my interview. Whatever the results are, I’ve enjoyed this experience.
While sitting on my sofa, I can see green leaves are looking fresh outside. In wind they’re moving and looking as if they’re busy doing their merry dance.
As I’m looking at these leaves, I can also hear a sound of hanging bells outside the screen door on entrance. This jingling sound gives me notion that it’s going to be a lovely week ahead.
A new start
Author Tim Wynne Jones considers writers to be like crows, much like crows, writers like to steal shiny bits of the world and hoard them away in their nest.
For a writer, his story is his nest.
I’m not sure what went wrong but life was moving so fast that I found it really hard to keep pace with it.
In all these months when I was not writing, I was busy observing.
A lot has been changed in my surrounding and we’re finally here in our newly constructed home.
Away from city, this society was originally a mango orchard. There are still lots of mango trees here and these mango trees are home to birds.
Some of these are rare birds.
In city, I never saw them but here I can see lots of starlings.
Starlings are noisy birds.
Bully birds is a most common name for them.
Last month, I completed my training and started conducting after school Maths and English classes from my home.
Few months back, my niece and nephew moved with us, they’re here for their higher studies.
Apart from noisy starlings, there’s no noise of cars here but in my home in the presence of my niece and nephew, there’s lot going on.
Waking them up for school is a hectic work but a fun job that I’m enjoying doing.
Life is busy but it has never been so kind before and while I’m guilty of not writing, I’m more happy for the start of this new year.
I’m grateful for all this beauty in my life.
Goodbye, Mr. Chips
When my cousin who’s about to complete his University expressed his dislike for James Hilton’s Goodbye Mr.Chips, I became defensive and wasted no time in suggesting that story is not that much boring and while we were busy sharing our thoughts, my uncle who himself read this story in his intermediate course intervened and also showed his lack of interest about the atmosphere in Mr. Chips.
It’s been thirty years that Mr. Chips is a part of intermediate course in my country and for some time a debate is going about removing it from syllabus.
Mr. Chips is a story of a school teacher about which it’s said that Hilton created this character after his father.
Originally written in 1934, the story is adapted into cinemafilms and two television presentations.
When some people are of the view that it should be removed and replaced by some modern tale, my mind takes me back to the time when our teacher would ask one of us to read a chapter from Mr. Chips and later she would translate it in Urdu for us.
At the end of lecture we were asked to prepare notes from guide books.
It was her way of teaching literature and this is the common way in which the novella is taught to our students in colleges.
Eminent Professor Bhem Singh Dihya from India always reminds his students that literature is a study of life and we cannot study Mr.Chips without establishing its connection with life.
In life, we often meet persons like Mr. Chips. They’re ordinary in appearances but they possessed some some special qualities.
Hilton’s character Mr. Chips knew how to teach languages and with this quality, he succeeded in leaving strong impact upon generation of students in his time.
Mr. Chips was a sincere soul and as a teacher, he did hardwork to achieve a high status at a Brookfield school.
How can we say that the world of Mr. Chips has grown old when themes of sincerity and hardwork towards one’s job are still relevant in our society of 2018?
Another criticism which is put forward by the opponents of this story is about love affair of Mr. Chips. They consider Katherine and Chips relation dull and boring.
Unlike modern tale of Twilight series, the love affair of Katherine and Chips was such that there’s lack of show of emotions in it but the reader needs to study the underlying theme in this love story of Katherine and Chips.
Katherine’s influence changed not only chauvinistic attitude of Mr. Chips but also altered him in a way that he became more effective teacher in a class.
How can we consider such kind of love dull when its influence alters personality to that much extent?
It somehow takes me back to 2008 when suicide attacks were common in country. Once it happened that while we were in class a suicide blast killed dozens of policemen near our University. Confusion erupted among students and phones started to ring immediately. Other teachers informed our Professor but he continued giving his lecture.
Our minds were so occupied with the situation outside that we didn’t grasp a thing from his lecture.
Now, there’s a scene in Hilton’s story where Mr. Chips in the midst of bombing not only kept on teaching Latin but also carried on cracking jokes so to divert the attention of frightened students in his class.
Our teacher on that day in our University class didn’t try to calm us down. He only wanted to complete his lecture and though he succeeded in doing so, he unlike Mr. Chips failed to leave any impact upon his students.
When my cousin is of the view that reading Mr. Chips is a mere waste of time, I’m of the opinion that it’s not the time to say good bye to Mr. Chips. Literature never gets old. It can’t be associated with certain time period and keeping this in view we still can learn a lot from Mr. Chips.
My words, My life 