Tag Archives: children

“To a Butterfly” by William Wordsworth [w/ Audio]

Posted on by
Reply 
Stay near me—do not take thy flight!
  A little longer stay in sight!
  Much converse do I find in Thee,
  Historian of my Infancy!
  Float near me; do not yet depart!
  Dead times revive in thee:
  Thou bring'st, gay Creature as thou art!
  A solemn image to my heart,
  My Father's Family!

  Oh! pleasant, pleasant were the days,
  The time, when in our childish plays
  My sister Emmeline and I
  Together chased the Butterfly!
  A very hunter did I rush
  Upon the prey:—with leaps and springs
  I follow'd on from brake to bush;
  But She, God love her! feared to brush
  The dust from off its wings.

“Nurse’s Song” by William Blake [w/ Audio]

Posted on by
Reply 
When the voices of the children are heard on the green
   And whisp'rings are in the dale,
 The days of my youth rise fresh in my mind,
   My face turns green and pale.

Then come home, my children, the sun is gone down,
   And the dews of night arise;
 Your spring & your day are wasted in play,
   And your winter and night in disguise.

Sonnet 3 by William Shakespeare [w/ Audio]

Posted on by
2 
Look in thy glass and tell the face thou viewst,
 Now is the time that face should form another,
 Whose fresh repair if now thou not renewest,
 Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother.
 For where is she so fair whose uneared womb
 Disdains the tillage of thy husbandry?
 Or who is he so fond will be the tomb
 Of his self-love, to stop posterity?
 Thou art thy mother's glass, and she in thee
 Calls back the lovely April of her prime;
 So thou through windows of thine age shalt see,
 Despite of wrinkles, this thy golden time.
   But if thou live rememb'rd not to be,
   Die single, and thine image dies with thee.

FIVE WISE LINES [March 2025]

Posted on by
1

Would the world ever have been made if its maker had been afraid of making trouble?

george bernard shaw, PygMalion

Refrain from talk of others’ shortcomings; don’t rest on your strengths.
[罔谈彼短; 靡恃己长.]

Thousand Character classic [千字文]

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

george bernard shaw, Man and superman

A child is the most reliable measure of time. His daily growth is proof of your daily ageing and decline. The child’s gains are your losses, and the closer a child gets to anything, the farther you withdraw, as though you were tied to one another on opposite spokes of a wheel and the wheel, without your noticing it, turns. Dawn for the child is dusk for you.

Otar chiladze, A Man was going down the road

We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.

George bernard shaw, Pygmalion

PROMPT: Favorite Animal

Posted on by
1
Daily writing prompt
What is your favorite animal?
View all responses

I’m not sure whether the intention is to determine one’s favorite species of animal or one’s favorite particular individual animal. I’ll presume the former as the latter would turn it into a “Which of your pets (or children — for those who count humans among the animal kingdom) do you love best?” type of question — which is awkward to ask anyone with whom one is not on intimate terms.

At any rate, I’ve come to think of assigning favorites as a bad habit of lazy minds, intended to negate the need to actively observe and to see the beauty and brilliance of whatever stands before one at any given moment. [It’s part of a vast array of patterns people develop to be as cognitively disengaged as can be managed.] So, I don’t have a favorite species of animal, but aardvark does come first in the dictionary, if not in my heart.

[Incidentally, when I had multiple pets, I did have a favorite, and — perhaps tellingly — it was the one whose personality was least like my own.]

“A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky” by Lewis Carroll [w/ Audio]

Posted on by
Reply 
A boat beneath a sunny sky,
 Lingering onward dreamily
  In an evening of July --

Children three that nestle near,
 Eager eye and willing ear,
  Pleased a simple tale to hear --

Long has paled that sunny sky:
 Echoes fade and memories die:
  Autumn frosts have slain July. 

Still she haunts me, phantomwise,
 Alice moving under skies
  Never seen by waking eyes.

Children yet, the tale to hear,
 Eager eye and willing ear,
  Lovingly shall nestle near.

In a Wonderland they lie,
 Dreaming as the days go by,
  Dreaming as the summers die:

Ever drifting down the stream --
 Lingering in the golden gleam --
  Life, what is it but a dream?

Multitasking Youth [Kyōka]

Posted on by
2 
a brave youth
 plummets into the stepwell,
 all the while
 looking like she's on a stroll,
 blowing her nose and waving.

PROMPT: Kid at Heart

Posted on by
3

What does it mean to be a kid at heart?

The capacity to see humor in flatulence, even when it’s your own.

Oh, wait, maybe I’m thinking of a “kid at fart.”

BOOK REVIEW: How to Live Like the Little Prince by Stéphane Garnier

Posted on by
Reply
How to Live Like the Little Prince: A Grown-Up's Guide to Rediscovering Imagination, Adventure, and AweHow to Live Like the Little Prince: A Grown-Up’s Guide to Rediscovering Imagination, Adventure, and Awe by Stéphane Garnier
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Amazon.in Page

Out: April 12, 2022

Given my reading of this book, I’m clearly a huge fan of Saint-Exupéry’s “The Little Prince,” and yet I had lukewarm regard for this book and found it a slog to read – despite its short page count and readable style. Don’t get me wrong; the writing is fine and the book raises some interesting points, but still I came away unsure that this book has a reason to exist. Ultimately, I figured out what bothered me is that it’s a little bit like going to hear your favorite comedian and then spending twice as long listening to someone else explain and elaborate upon their jokes. “The Little Prince” is brilliant, but it’s a simple book with a simple theme and simple lessons, and I don’t know what value is added by even a skillfully crafted self-help elaboration upon the book. As far as stars go, I give the book the benefit of the doubt based on the fact [full disclosure] that I almost never like self-help books, and exceptions to that rule only come about if the book can teach me something about which I had no idea or if it is in itself so clever or beautiful of language that I’m moved.

If you liked “The Little Prince” (and, note: you’ll have to have read it for the references in the book to make much sense,) and you like self-help books, this will probably be right up your alley. But if you like “The Little Prince” and aren’t a self-help fan, then just read the original story again.


View all my reviews

POEM: Unbridled Exuberance

Posted on by
6

DC03D3AF-796E-42D9-8D39-AF9EA4C37E8C

At the sight of I know not what,
something — or, maybe, someone —pointed out by his grinning granny,

I saw a boy run in place,

overcome by enthusiasm from the waist down —
like a cherubic Michael Flatley sans the coordination, but with exuberance to spare.

At the sight of the boy,
I couldn’t help but ask myself when my idle setting got turned down so low.

Surely, once upon a time, there was something that so excited me that my limbs bypassed central control and spastically did their own thing…

but I can’t remember when.