Be kind and tender to the Frog, And do not call him names, As 'Slimy skin,' or 'Polly-wog,' Or likewise 'Ugly James,' Or 'Gape-a-grin, or 'Toad-gone-wrong,' Or 'Billy Bandy-knees': The Frog is justly sensitive To epithets like these. No animal will more repay A treatment kind and fair; At least so lonely people say Who keep a frog (and, by the way, They are extremely rare).
If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?
First of all, I’d say that I probably could live most places in the world, and the few I couldn’t (e.g. North Korea) have no appeal to me as a place of residence. Having lived several places in the US, a couple years in England, and now over ten years in India, I’m under no illusions that there is a Shangri-la out there, a perfect utopia. Most places are fine places to live if one is flexible-minded and can adapt to that place’s rhythms and peculiarities. There may be a honeymoon period during which some place seems better than the rest, but even the most seemingly idyllic place will lose its luster in time.
That’s why I recommend travel. Everyplace offers beauty and life lessons when taken in bite-size pieces.
the foggy valley looks like a depthless painting through fall foliage.
Tell all the truth but tell it slant -- Success in Circuit lies Too bright for our infirm Delight The Truth's superb surprise As Lightning to the Children eased With explanation kind The Truth must dazzle gradually Or every man be blind --
The Understory by Saneh SangsukWhat’s the coolest thing you’ve ever found (and kept?)
I once found a $100 bill by the curb on a rundown street that was about half abandoned buildings. I assumed it had been dropped by a drug dealer because not a lot of other people in that neighborhood had $100 bills in quantities such that they could cascade out of their pockets without notice. And there weren’t a lot of people hanging out in that particular area that weren’t up to something. But I didn’t keep it so much as spend it. I’m not much of a stuff collector, and I early learned that cool rocks and shells and such belong where they are and I take pictures, not souvenirs.
My father was a farmer. He, on rare occasion over decades of farming, turned up something interesting in the act of turning the soil (e.g. a mastodon tooth and some decomposing metal antiques.)
dry and yellow, fall leaves hang on like a thick head of gray hair.
Full fathom five thy father lies,
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange:
Sea nymphs hourly ring his knell.
Ding-dong!
Hark! Now I hear them,
Ding-dong, bell!
NOTE: From The Tempest Act 1: Scene 2
the sun is low,
but then it never gets high
this time of year.
Tiger Riding for Beginners 