Quotes That Capture the Magic and Power of Books

"That's the thing about books. They let you travel without moving your feet."

Jhumpa Lahiri 

"Reading is a conversation. All books talk. But a good book listens as well."

Mark Haddon

"A book is a dream that you hold in your hands."

Neil Gaiman

"Some books you read. Some books you enjoy. But some books just swallow you up, heart and soul." 

Joanne Harris

"The book to read is not the one that thinks for you but the one which makes you think." 

Harper Lee

You may add any quote you have come across on the topic in your comments. 

Nature has Its Own Ways to Act:

Scene One:

A traveler was walking through a jungle (forest).  There were thick trees all around casting a cool shadow in the heat of summer.  He was tired and wanted to rest.  He lied down under a tree.  Soon after the cool shadow and the breeze lullabied him to fall in deep calm sleep. 

While the man was in deep and calm sleep there was a slithering movement in a hole near the tree, and there came a venomous snake out of the hole.  The snake saw the man it’s natural enemy.  It raised and was ready to strike the man with its deadly fangs.

Scene Two:

At the very moment when the man of our story was lying under the tree and the snake was ready to bite him, on the other side of the river nearby a scorpion was moving very fast toward the river and jumped on the back of a turtle, which was about to move into the water. 

The turtle swam on the other side of the river.  When it got near the bank of the river the scorpion jumped off its back and moved fast towards where the man was lying asleep and the snake was ready to strike.

The scorpion got near the man and bit him in his leg.  The pinch of the bite steered the man awake.  He saw the snake close to him.  He instantly picked his stick lying near him and hit on the head of the snake dropping it dead in just one blow.

The man looked at the running away scorpion with thankful tears in his eyes murmured looking up to the sky, “you really have your own ways to act, thanks.”

As life goes on and we ascend the ladder of age, a lot of the time we think ourselves either too experienced or too long in the tooth to learn new things or new ways of doing old things.  But knowledge has no age or ending and while we are still walking on the well-trodden path of ours, the world has not seized to spin.  Changes in eternal.  So, why do we separate or alienate ourselves from something as natural as change and the process of learning?  Why do we deliberately sabotage ourselves and stunt our growth?  Why do we then blame everything else around us for the things that then happen to us?  Do we not then make a self-fulfilling prophecy for ourselves?

These are all rhetorical but self-searching questions.  We need to ask these from ourselves on a regular basis lest we think ourselves above the elements of change and externalities.  This issue deals with ways to make the process of self-understanding and discovery smoother and more understandable.  May it be someone who is starting a new or someone who has been at it for a long time.  There is always something new or unique to learn a new perspective or an innovative technique that not only stimulates the fertile mind but also saves time and brings further ripples of change in the world.  

Idea for the subject borrowed

They Are Not Ordinary People

Once there was a saint, a Sufi naturally had no worldly wealth except his knowledge of spiritualism and Sufiism.  Used to do sundries to earn his daily bread for himself and his daughter.  Wife was passed away a long time ago.  He also had a disciple who also used to help him in his works as well as learn knowledge. The daughter grew up and the saint like all the other fathers wanted to get her married, but to whom he didn’t have anything which would attract the boys to get married the daughter of a poor man. 

The saint talked to his disciple and showed his wish to give the hand of his daughter to him in marriage.  The disciple got worried because he was also a very poor man and lived nearby in a hut-like home of simply one room.  He said to the teacher that he was very poor and not a simple big house where she could be happily live with him.  The saint told him that his daughter is well educated in what he has taught her and very religious.  She would be very contented with what the boy will give her for a living.

The disciple was convinced by the teacher and they got married.  The bride shifted from his father’s hut to her husband’s hut.  The girl entered the house.  There was nothing at all in there, just a mat, simple pillow and pitcher of water, and a clay oven for cooking. Nothing else.  The girl took a cursory look of the surrounding and then started to cry. 

The boy got worried and said, “I already told your father that you will not be happy living with me, because I am very poor, and see now you are crying for this.” 

The daughter of the saint said, “I am not crying for the poverty you have, I am crying to see the bread you have kept for your future eating.  It means you do not have faith in our Lord that He will be able to give you food for your future.  I am crying because how I could live with a man having so weak faith………………………”

PS: We are ordinary people.  It is allowed to us to think about our future and make whatever is within our reach to save it. But in their world, it is considered a weak faith in  Lord.  They belong to the other world where their tests and examinations of life get tougher and tougher as they rise higher spiritually in their path.

This is my father!

He is my father, very unsocial and carefree.  We are his two kids, a son and a daughter, me.  I know my father loves me more than he loves my brother.  I enjoy this privilege belonging to a daughter loving family.  I have pictures when I was a child, I see myself sometimes in his laps, sometimes riding on him and giggling.  I remember whenever by brother teased me or snatched my toys or color pencils or refuse to do anything asked, I used to phone my father and he always used to say, “what happened baita?, what he’s done now?  Is he teasing you again?  OH! Broke your toys!  Tut tut, ok don’t cry I will bring you the new ones, yes I won’t bring anything for him, just relax,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,”

I am now grown up,  and my brother is grown up too and gone abroad, I am here alone to enjoy all the love, care and even a look full of affection of my father.   I am married now.  When I was getting married,  my father was very happy (but sad too).  He used to say,  “baita, what will I do when you are gone?” 

Yes, This is my father!

Repeated

Following story idea came to my mind on reading Rosemary's blog 7 faces..... Thanks, Rosemary! (Please be noted that I have already written this in brief in a comment of mine on some blog).

The Deeds Reflect!

He was an artist, a painter. His paintings were very much taken by the admirers of the art. He wanted to make a painting which he wished, would break all his previous records. He was thinking about an idea, a topic very unique based on which he would make a remarkable piece of art. While he was planning to have some idea or topic to make his wish a reality, he had a visitor, a lady with a little boy. She wanted him to make the portrait of her son. Her son was very beautiful, all his innocent beauty was reflecting from his blushing face.   His sinless smile was making him an angel in real. The painter got impressed, and an idea was switched on in his mind. He agreed to make the portrait of the boy. He made two paintings of the boy, one for the lady and one for himself, and kept the other one for himself with the permission of the lady against the cost of his services. The lady agreed willingly and left happily with the painting.

Seeing the boy very first time the painter got the idea why would he not make two paintings showing the extremes of two aspects, the extreme beauty and innocence and against this the extreme devilish ugliness. The first part he had already made. He then started to look for the subject which would come up to the level of ugliness as was in his mind the extremely grotesque and appalling character, but he could not find any such character, there were many on earth, as it is natural to exist the ugliness as it exists the beauty, but couldn’t find any such, which came up to his artistic mind. He anyway kept looking for it.

20 years passed and when he was going to leave the idea of extreme beauty and ugliness he came across with a character. He was lying in a corner of a building, very ugly, seemed to be the drug addict, his eyes were blood red, and all the filth was all over him. The artist very hesitatingly got closer to him. The man got alert seeing him getting closer. He stood up. The artist somehow convinced him to understand what he wanted from him and the man agreed to come with him to his studio.

While he was making all the preparation of making his portrait and told him what his idea was for which he had waited for such a long time.

The portrait of ugliness was completed and while the man was ready to leave he asked him whom he chose to reflect the beauty. The artist showed him the portrait of the little boy he made 20 years ago. Seeing the picture of the boy, the man got shocked and started crying. The artist asked him why he was crying seeing the picture. The ugly man turned with eyes full of the tears to leave, saying, “It is me in this picture when I was a boy, but the lashes of the time and the deeds turned me ugly.”

Reading Danny’s Writing Challenge: Back to Idioms and Phrasal Verbs I over-confidently thought that it was not a big deal and I would run off a story based on all the idioms provided by him.  But that was not the case. I ran on thinking how to cope with it.  I ran my mind hard over some hints, some points, some ideas, but my mind was totally blocked.  It seemed that I was running like a hairy goat.  I was feeling like I ran out of all the thoughts, ideas, even glimpses of some romance.  “Oh! The writing was not so complicated for me, but this topic has made me run into the ground.”   It seemed that I was a newbie unable to write even a few lines.  My heart was running like the clappers in dejection.  Danny’s topic ran me down.  I had never run so short of ideas.  So, I decided to run down and not to write anything.  But please do not consider my being run over. It is just for the time being.  I will come back and face it once again.

In response to Danny writing challenge: Spring Fairly Tale, though this is not a fairy tale in that sense.

She was gone, disappeared.  I was feeling that she was getting sick, her color was fading, getting white, day by day.  When I looked at her, a pinching shiver used to sweep throughout my body. 

“Are you sick? You are looking so colorless, what is happening to you?”

There rose a feeble smile on her fading lips, the lips which were so red when I saw her first, so full of life.  It was very hard for me to stop myself touching them just to know how delicate they were.  She tried to show her happiness seeing me so concern about her. 

“You love me so much.  What will if I die”  She asked me with all sadness in her eyes.

 “Is there any doubt in your mind about my love, and do not talk about dying.  If you die I will die, too.  I come to see you here in this garden daily without fail, though I see all around me wherever I go, your beauty, your colors, your fragrance all around me.  You were so beautiful, so charming, so full of life when I saw you first a few months ago, but now you are getting yellowish, and even white. What is happening to you?”  

Seeing my love for her she once again tried to bring the smile on her drying lips.  “It is all natural, don’t you see, there is death after life and then life after death.  It has been happening here since this earth was created.  I am dying, but do not worry I will come back when it is over.” 

And it did happen.  She disappeared. No sign of her was there.  The entire place was covered with snow, and the cold wind was blowing as it was wailing on her death. She was nowhere.  Even the glimpse of her green, blue, red, yellow, purple colors was nowhere to see.  Only whiteness was prevailing.

I came back and almost shut myself inside.  Months passed, I got myself covered with layers of clothes to hide from the freezing sadness. I didn’t know how the time was passing.  The track of time seemed to be lost.  Then one morning I again hear the chirping of birds outside.  I got off my bed and went outside. I saw she was once again appearing, I ran to the garden to see whether she was there.  Yes, she was there.  Once again life has bestowed upon her and she was alive.  “Oh, my life, you are alive.  How delighted to see you once again my ‘spring’!  

That was a nice evening.  I got up and went to the kitchen to make coffee in my desi way.  I first put a cup of milk in a pot and put it on the electric burner.  Let it boil.  When it has been boiled, I put one full spoon of Nescafe into it and let it boil.  After one or two minutes, it the coffee grain completely mixed and dissolved into the milk.  My coffee was ready.  I poured into my coffee mug and took it outside into my gallery.  I put the mug on the small round table and sat down on my chair.  I was about to take a sip of my coffee when I heard some disturbance on the road just outside my house.  I put the cup away and went to see what was happening.  There was a man who had been fallen down on the road from his scooter because at car hit him and ran.  I along with some other neighbors rushed to the man and help him standing up.  He was not physically hurt but got nervous.  I asked him where he was all right.  He tried to speak but could not say anything, just looked at me with worried eyes.  I asked me to come inside and requested one of my neighbors to put his scooter near my house.  I helped the man to walk to where I was sitting and about to have my coffee.  I let him sit on another chair, and relax.  After awhile I offered him my cup of coffee.  He took it from me and started to drink sip by sip.  I was looking at him, and thinking:  There is written the name of the eater on each and every grain.  That cup of coffee was not for me......................................................

He was my class fellow from 7 to 10 grades.  He was the most intelligent student in the entire school.  Always got highest marks not only in our own class but in the whole school exams.  He never got less than 100% marks in mathematics as I remember.  I was second to him, in spite of trying my utmost to at least get equal to him.  But never, I envied him very often.  Besides in studies, he was the most gentle, humble, polite, and cultured boy, and above all, we were best friends.  Sat on the same bench.  Both of us mostly kept us much ahead of what our teacher used to teach, especially in the maths.  

In our 10^th grade, we both stood in the first division, though his marks were higher than mine. In matriculation, if a student got 60% of the total marks he stood in the first division.  I got around 69% whereas he got around 75%, and got qualified for scholarship in college. 

We got admission in same engineering college.  He was same intelligent and sharp even in the college, where I was feeling difficulties to cope up with the teaching system of the college.  It was totally different from school, there was no help from the lecturers and you have to do all the preparation yourself, which I was finding very difficult.

In the third year of graduation, he got admission one of the top engineering university (level) college, and I stayed behind, and sort of left my education. But I used to see him.  I used to visit him at his home.

One day I found him sad.  I asked him the reason,  then very first time he opened his life to me.  He told me about the girl he loved,  “So what, you have a good future, you are intelligent, a good life is ahead of you, what is the problem, marry her.”

“I can’t do it, though she does want to marry me, but I can’t destroy her life!”  His eyes were welled with tears.  I got shocked, “How come you destroy her life?”  I could not control my shock. “Because I am getting blind.”  “What!” I was dumbfounded, “You have never told me that, I was your friend.”  I was got worried and felt very miserable for him.  “Have you seen any doctor?”  “Yes,” he told me, but there is no remedy for my disease here in Pakistan. I have some retinal problem, not the lenses problem so that change them.  We have researched and found that may be in Russia they have some success in the remedy of this type of eyes sickness.  And I am going to Dubai, where my eldest brother works, and from there we will try to make the arrangement. But there are very fewer chances.”

I could not give him even some encouraging words, hope, or wishes, just left him praying for him in my heart, which was extremely heavy because of the sadness for such an intelligent person, who never got any lower success in his entire education career.”

That was the last time I saw him when he was nearest to get blind.  He then went as he told me since then I could have a single clue about him, what had happened to him.  I don’t know whether he got recovered because he never replied my messages.  I visited his house too, but his entire family has left the place.

I hope that he would be okay and have a good life with the girl he loved.

This is Danny’s Writing Challenge.

“If I Were an Inventor”. 

If I could invent anything that would have been ‘love’.  But love cannot be an invention.  An invention of a thing is made which does not exist previously. But love is there since the time memorial.  Yes, love is always there, it is another thing that we have forgotten it, or have buried it in the dust and/or ashes of our meanness, our hypocrisy, our selfishness. It would, therefore, be a discovery, a reviving, an incarnation, an avatar. 

There is so much lacking love despite its demand to prevail among us, within us, imbibe the very whole of us.  Love is needed for peace, to let people live in peace, happiness, tranquility, harmony.  There is the disaster all around us, natural and or man-made. Humanity is being destroyed, people are dying in numbers of hundreds and thousands by the tyranny of their own people or by the other oppressors in the name of helping the oppressed. So there is need to discover, to unearth love, rather than any invention.  And God knows whether we are going to use any invention for the benefit of mankind or for destroying it. Can’t we seek for the love only?

I had to see her.  I should have been in time because I hate to see her wait for long, but I had gotten my hand tight and I could not leave on time.  I ought to have called her but I couldn’t.  I must have been there as promised.  But life, oh! Life makes so difficult for us sometimes. I could have lost her trust. She might have thought I did nothing to keep my words.  I felt so disappointed in myself, I ought to have let her know my problem in any way.  I might have called her but I was heavily busy, and couldn’t have joined her in her party, while I was the only one to the party, just two of us.  Oh, the people who are busy in their life have no right to love.

On a leisure day, I was cleaning the drawer of my writing-table which had got overflowed with the papers and different articles which had been dropping in it for last many years.

I was taking the papers and other articles out from the drawer and putting separately. I was taking a cursory look at each paper to assess whether it is important or not.

When it was almost half empty I thrust my hand into the back of the drawing to look for any other important paper. When I drag my hand out there was a folded paper stuck in between my fingers. “Wha the hell is that” It looked very old, I might have put it years ago, I unfolded the paper and ran my eyes on it. As I was reading what was written in it, my mouth got opened in surprise and the same time a smile blossomed on my lips.

That was a love letter written by me and never sent or given to whom it was written.

Following was the letter:

“My dear,

You are very beautiful, I can’t express your beauty in words, but all the flowers I see, it seems to me that they have taken the color and delicacy from you. When I see your hairs waving in the air with the jerk of your body, they remind me the clouds which shadowed the scorching ground, and your face was just like the moon peeping through the dark clouds. Your lips remind me the delicate petals of a rose. I don’t know why I always see you in my dreams. You are always in my memories. I always try to look for you. When I do not see you, I find my heart feel as if it is under a heavy burden. Oh, my dear, I think I am in love with you. I wanted to open my heart before you verbally, but I do not find the courage. That is why I am putting my heart here on this paper and present to you…………………”

“What are you doing?” I turned to see my wife smiling at me. “After all you got the idea to clean this mess up! By the way memories, you have found hidden in this drawer?” She was still smiling. I handed the letter to her, “I have found this………………”

“After all you got the idea to clean this mess up! By the way what memories, you have found hidden in this drawer?” She was still smiling. I handed the letter to her, “I have found this………………”
She took the letter and read it, then she laughed out loud, “When did you write this letter and for whom?

“Long time ago when I was in the college” I replied her smile with a smile.

“Didn’t you give it to her?’ I shook my head, “No.” “Why?” She asked.

“I was going to give it to her, she was having a joyful chat with one of her friends. When I got close to them, I heard she was taking my name. I got excited, I hid behind the bush to eavesdrop.

“Whom you are talking about?” She asked.  Her friend took my name. She said, “Him, how can it be, he is just a common ordinary looking boy, how can I fall in love with him…………….shit!”

“I turned back, came home dejected, and threw this letter into this drawer to forget it and her. It took a long time but I recovered, and paid all my attention to my education and career.”

‘Remember once you said,” My wife said getting closer to me, “that it is not necessary every eye has the ability to see what is a real beauty hidden within a personality. Tell me do my eyes have that ability?”

I smiled and said, "let’s clean this mess up".

You may write me down in history 
With your bitter, twisted lies, 
You may tread me in the very dirt 
But still, like dust, I'll rise. 

Does my sassiness upset you? 
Why are you beset with gloom? 
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells 
Pumping in my living room. 

Just like moons and like suns, 
With the certainty of tides, 
Just like hopes springing high, 
Still, I'll rise. 

Did you want to see me broken? 
Bowed head and lowered eyes? 
Shoulders falling down like teardrops. 
Weakened by my soulful cries. 

Does my haughtiness offend you? 
Don't you take it awful hard 
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines 
Diggin' in my own back yard. 

You may shoot me with your words, 
You may cut me with your eyes, 
You may kill me with your hatefulness, 
But still, like air, I'll rise. 

Does my beauty upset you? 
Does it come as a surprise 
That I dance like I've got diamonds 
Glittering in my eyes? 

Out of the huts of history's shame 
I rise 
Up from the past that's rooted in pain 
I rise 
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide, 
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide. 
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear 
I rise 
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear 
I rise 
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, 
I am the dream and the hope of the slave. 
I rise 
I rise 
I rise

Not written by me, but a friend of mine by the nickname Lady Flower emailed it to me a long time ago.

" Education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's  being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't."

Education is the main medium on which depends the progress of intellect of an individual as well as a nation. This is the education which gets an individual out of ignorant…(ignorance is “what you don’t know”) and guides him to the right path…………the path of wisdom (wisdom is what “you do know”).

Education is the only source of the progress of constructive attitude in the human being. Education gives us knowledge of ‘rules and regulations’ of political, social, cultural without which a nation is nothing but a soulless body.  The absence of education, or at least the status quo of further progress of education in a nation, takes it to nothingness and this nothingness is again the inability to differentiate between what you know and what you don't."

The aim of education isn’t how much we have committed to our memory for the sake of passing certain exams nor it is just for earning money for living, but its purpose is to train intelligence, attitude, and morale of an individual. Intelligence, attitude or behavior and moral are so linked with each other like body and soul. Its purpose is not just gaining of information, but its purpose is to polish a person’s intellect, and abilities. In brief, it can be said that EDUCATION IS FOR BUILDING CHARACTER AND PERSONALITY OF A PERSON. 

How could all these qualities be developed? Of course by Education, but according to the above quote ……………….. It's  being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't."

The portion of the quote “what you don’t” means the dark side of our behavioral intelligence which does not allow us to see the bad deeds or the sins we commit. Ignorance is a sin, it is tyranny (zulm )(and we are Zaalim)(Tyrant) because sometimes ignorance takes us to behave like a tyrant.   So knowing (education) is the ability to differentiate between knowing and not knowing, when an individual gets to the realization of his status, and mends him/herself, there comes a healthy educated society, in resultant, there comes peace, love, and harmony.

A human being is a very simple creation, but at the same time, it has emotional, psychological and nerve (tolerance, bearing, coping up with) complication. Sometimes they are courageous sometimes overawing, shying, egocentric. Sometimes they are courageously open, express their love boldly, sometimes because of shyness and or egocentrism, they hide their emotion in some deviation and distraction like in my story SHOELACES. If you have watched (if not please do watch) last episode (the ending) of Harry Potter. You will understand “the medium” of this deviation and distraction. I remember a long time ago I read a short story in which the same distraction was mentioned. These two events, Harry Potter, and the short story were in my mind and I had kept them in the safe locker of my memory box to use sometime. I have a number of times told my readers in EC that events, incidents, clues hints, ideas are scattered, exist all around us. You have to have just an observing eye. Stories and blogs come out of your thoughts like sprinkles from a fountain, drops of dew sparkling on the leaves in a fresh morning.

I have a number of times told my readers in EC that events, incidents, clues hints, ideas are scattered all around us. You have to have just an observing eye. Stories and blogs come out of your thoughts like sprinkles from a fountain and drops of dew sparkling on the leaves in a fresh morning.

Anyway, I was talking about the hiding of emotions within self or using some distraction and deviation in a medium like ‘shoelaces’. Yes, this is not good for the relationship. Sometimes it creates complicated deprivation. Ghazi in my story Shoelaces is the victim of the same complication. Maybe because of his shyness or egocentric, maybe he does not understand his own feelings, or in his particular case he does not have much time to understand himself and or Sara’s feelings and called back by his parents to get married. Anything can be possible. I leave it to my readers to decide. But it is an undeniable fact that one if find him/herself in any of such circumstances at least open your heart, if not to the subject, to any trustworthy friend for an advice. Remember not all stories have happy endings.

I remember in one of my blogs (http://www.myenglishclub.com/profiles/blogs/writing-challenge-a-page-from-my-biography-1)

I mentioned:

“MI was deep in thought while they both walked back to home. He was thinking whether it was possible that a man could get his very first love (a quiet, unspoken, undeclared love), as his life partner, for whom he longed since he came into the senses of boyhood since he started to know the ‘LOVE’.”

And you know what did she say when I told my wife about this after marriage,?

“Why didn’t you tell me before!  So much time would have been saved from being wasted!!”

Shoelaces

I saw him after a long time. He was tying shoelaces of a little boy; the resemblance was showing the boy must be his son.  He was still so graceful, nice and admirable. The everlasting quietness was still there on his face which always charmed me and drew me towards him.  His eyes were the same as quiet and lost somewhere.  Some gray traces in his hairs depicting the time which has passed since I saw him last. 

I never met him in the sense to call a real meeting. I could never have succeeded in talking with him but some formal talk.  Though I tried very hard to get closed to him.  We were in the same college, though not in the same grade, he was one year senior to me.  I never found him with people whom I could call ‘friends’.  But I was at the age where every girl wanted to have someone whom she can call her own.  I started feeling my heart softening since the very first day I saw him, coming out of the class.  I almost jogged to get to near him. 

“Hi, I am Sara!” I stretched my hand to shake his.  He turned his face, looked into my eyes, I didn’t know what he saw there, he got blushed, and at once bent down and started tying his shoe laces. 

“Hey Sara, come on we are getting late for the next class!”

I was distracted by a friend of mine, the next moment I saw he was gone.

Time was passing, and I was not finding any chance to meet him, though I most of the time saw him walking around, moving between the classes, in the library.  

Exactly I saw him everywhere, might it be real or my imagination.  I always found my heart to look for him or to see him at least around.  I knew from other people, his name was Ghazi, might be an Arabic name, I exactly did not know.

Once I got a chance to catch him sitting alone on a bench in a corner. 

“Hello Ghazi, I am Sara, do you remember me?”

“ye..yes!” He seemed to be getting nervous. 

I did not want to lose this chance, so I opened my book and stretched towards him, 

“Could you please explain this for me, I am a bit confused about this chapter, you are being senior, and as I was told that you do have the power on the subject, and helped many students……………so please!”

I didn’t need any explanation on the chapter because I had already understood it myself, but I want to have a chance to stay with him a bit longer.

He took the book from my hand threw a cursory look at the chapter closed the book, handed back to me and started speaking.  Then I knew how authority he had on the subject.  He was explaining as he himself written the book.  I was looking into his eyes, surveying every color, every light reflecting from them.  He then stopped.  I felt that the entire surrounding became quiet, there was no sound, but the beat of my heart.  There were, dampness in my eyes, 

“I……………”

Before I say something, he looked into my eyes and at once bend down and started tying his shoe laces.   Then I knew his shoelaces always were untie or he kept them as it is.

He stood up and gone, saying, “hope you understood the chapter now, you can ask anytime when you need any help.”  There was a slight smile on his face. It was not a smile, but a ray of hope for me.

Then we became friends, as I felt, but since then he never avoided me.  I always tried to keep his company whenever I got the chance. Sometimes he himself found me and we sat in the same corner where I first have found him. 

My reader has now got the idea that I was in love with him, but you know I never found the chance to express my love to him.  It is not that I did not try, I tried a lot, but he was kinda person who just couldn’t find himself bear or understand or didn’t want to understand.  He never objected my holding his hand, he never ignored my smiling while talked with him, but whenever I got my eyes full of love for him, and he looked at it, he always bent down and start tying his shoelaces, which I never found tied.

Then one day I found out that he was gone, left the college nobody knew where and why he was gone.  I tried to get information from the office, they just told me that he went back to his country when he received an urgent mail from his parents.

I cried a lot, to lose him, to lose my love which I could never confess.  

Time didn’t stop for me, it passed and passed a lot, I got married and then divorced after few years.  Might be my husband couldn’t tolerate my being always lost in my imagination.  We decided to get separated, we had no children so there was no complicacy in deciding so, he moved on his own way and me my own still lost in my world. 

Now after many years I once again saw him, again tying shoe laces. This time not his own, his son’s.

I rushed towards him, “Hey Ghazi……….Ghazi, wait!” He turned and stopped to see me.  “Hello I am Sara, do you remember me?” I stretched my hand to shake his as we were meeting the first time.  

He took my hand in his. He was smiling, his eyes were shining with pleasure, he was pleased to see me.

“Your son?” “Yes! Say hello to Sara Faizi!”

“Haaii,” his son Faizi said to me looking at me with delight. 

“Where is your wife?”  “Died when he was born, couldn’t survive” There was a gloom in his voice. 

“Oh, I am sorry.  I also got married, but my marriage could not survive!”

“How! Why!!” He asked.

I looked at him, my eyes were full of tears, there were all suffering of love I had gone through, without him.  He felt the heat emitting from my eyes and as usual bent down to tie his shoelaces, but there were no laces in his shoes this time, he turned to his son’s shoes,

“What are you doing papa, you have just tied my laces”. 

He stood up, looked into my eyes, his eyes were also filled with tears.

“Ghazi, how long will you hide your love behind the shoe laces?  How long?”

He felt the pain and my pleading, took my hand in his, “let’s go!”

His son released his hand ran around, held my hand and said, “Yes let’s go!”  

This on the motivation of Luci's Writing Challenge: Who Am I.

It's Me

I am an aging matured man of average height and build (70 to 75 Kgs in weight). I have short shining silver/gray hair,  usually have a center parting, and seldom comb them back. I have French Cut beard and mustache. I have dark blackish brown eyes and eyebrows neither bushy nor thin.

I am a realist as well as an idealist. I am habitually reserved and quiet. I mostly do not exhibit my love and emotions. I am very cautious and disciplined.  I am an optimist (some time pessimist too).  In general, I am mild and soft-spoken, but in anger, I burst out loud.

I prefer to listen than to talk.  People find me uneasy going.  I am very faithful to my commitments. I am always ready to help the needy ones but within my capacity not in a heroic way. Although I am extremely unsociable, always try to avoid parties, even family wedding ceremonial parties. I am a hardcore for friends, and for them, it is not easy to read my emotions.

 I am the humblest person on earth. There is nothing in me to make me famous or popular among any circle. I have a common personality.  But I like it.  I like to watch rather than be watched.

If there happens to exist anything remarkable in me, I as me can never have the courage to put forward to feel proud.  But however, I do have a personality of my own.  There are good qualities and bad qualities both in me.  Bad qualities may be more than good qualities. 

Bad qualities:

1.  I am not social.

2.  I do not make friends easily.

3.  I do not show my affection (easily).

4.  I do not have the courage to confess my love (though I talk about it very much). 

5.  I do not trust people (easily).

6.  I let myself burn inside, but do not let the heat comes out.

Good qualities:

1.  I respect all irrespective of cast and creeds.

2.  I am full of love.

3.  I can’t stop myself from praising beauty. If I do not express verbally my shows the liking.

 4.  Is my life worth living?

Let me be a bit orthodox. I have been created by my Creator and the Creator does not create any WORTHLESS thing. So my life surely has some WORTH on the planet. I am still able to think and express what I feel, what I observe, what I experience, the pain I suffer the joy I enjoy. I am still able to attract the attention of the people around me. Isn’t it worthy besides what I have mentioned above?

Please be noted that this is not a self-boasting.  This is mere a blog for the sake of blogging in response to Luci’s Challenge.

Above is based on a number of my own blogs previously posted.

The night is bright and illuminated, but I am wandering sad and dejected.  What is this place, so strange, I am alone, every mate has gone. How long I would wander alone. O’ gloom of my heart what to do. O’ frustration of my heart what to do.  Everywhere is lightening, but it feels like the chain in my ankles, hindering me to move, to go to her, she is right there, in front of me, so near in my imagination, so far in reality.  The brightness of illumination is cutting my sight like the bright shining sword.

The moon is shining, she is there in cool light shadow, there are stars twinkling in the sky above her. How chaste, like the thought of a saint, or of a lover.  But, does she know the condition of my heart. I am dejected, she is seeing me, and smiling, I am floating, but not reaching her, I am dejected.  There breaks a star, falling down, the symbol of hope, but who knows, in whose lap this lace of pearls will fall. I get hope, but I am dejected, can’t find the way, to reach her, all the struggle gives pain in my chest and the ache in my heart.

Happiness is everywhere but for me the taunts and scorns, “there goes the majnoo, there he goes,  the aashiq, nakara, awara! (lover, useless, loafer!).

Shall I quit, but this is not my habit. Shall I go back?  No, this is not in my instinct.  Shall I have her?  But this is not in my luck.  But, it is in my will to burn in love.  I know there is a storm of hardships waiting for me being burnt in love.  She is not for me. It is Just my imagination, there are hundreds of doors opened for me, but my promise, to love none, but her.  O’ gloom of my heart what to do. O’ frustration of my heart what to do. “Break the promise and leave the hope. It will be right for you to break the chain of ‘desire’, and free yourself.”

The basic idea has been taken from Urdu poetry.  

Writing Challenge: My Story Behind the Picture

• Posted by Luci

Desire

She was in my arm and we both were dancing, floating all over the dancing floor. There was no one but us. Me and her.  Her long red silky frock was flurrying with the swings of our movements, exposing her exposed beauty even more.  I was letting myself burned in the sweet heat of her charm making me draw her close. When I took a long swing holding her in my arm, I saw a reflection of me in one of the large mirrors hanging on the walls. I shuddered, that was an ugly skeleton draped in a long gown, my head was covered in a hood.  How could it be possible?  “I can’t be that ugly.  I am so handsome, so charming, that’s this beautiful girl attracted towards me and accepted my invitation to dance with me.  But how I have turned into a beast” I was thinking and dancing, dancing and thinking.  She was not aware of my transformation because her eyes were closed.  It seemed that she was also enjoying my nearness.  Then I saw in the mirror, she had also turned into an ugly skeleton, ugly and horrible.  I shuddered even more and released her from my grip, she was falling away from me with a shriek………………but that was my shriek, I found out while my eyes opened.   Oh, I fell asleep last night while watching “Beauty and the Beast”

I didn’t move, sitting still, was thinking, I might have seen the beast inside me, but why did she transform into one……………………………..