#samplepiece

[quirkysewingknit]

#366days day 55, I have been having a go at Tunisian crochet, I quite like the way this yarn is showing up the stitches. Don't know yet what this is going to become if anything as it is just a sample trial piece to practise the stitch. #zoknitandsew #tunisiancrochet #wip #samplepiece #variegatedyarns #crochet #practisepiece https://www.instagram.com/p/B88W_C9lSLQ/?igshid=1m1fmxvx0esy

[cincygirlstyle]

Creative release before bed. Swipe left to see the before and after, of this cute coin purse. Cut, sewn and painted by me✨ #samplepiece #practice #crafts #create #accessories #smallleathergoods #handmade #handmadeaccessories #myartwork #absractart #cincygirlstyle #makersgonnamake #leather #paint #oneofakind #hobbies #nightlife #womensfashion #wearableart #beforeandafter

[samplepiece]

The song of the Valley of Flowers

I just want to be there Away from the vehicles where Our feet will be our only transport With the Himalays in the backdrop Nearly touching the sun floating low With flowers blooming in the valley below

I just want to be there To feel and smell the land where The great sages and scholars trod Which is the Lord's abode Overlooked by peaks covered in snow With flowers blooming in the valley below

I just want to be there To drink from the hole from where The great, mother-rivers emerge To merge, converge and diverge And to cleanse all that is in the way of its flow With flowers blooming in the valley below

I just want to be there To be with myself where The silence screams the holy hymns The swollen heart dreams  The happy dreams and fills up the inner hollow With flowers blooming in the valley below

[samplepiece]

The princess of Hypocliberia

Gather around blokes, its time for a story. Once upon a time there lived a beautiful princess in the kingdom of Hypocliberia. She was a charming, friendly and intelligent lady of nineteen with a heart so tender that anyone’s pain could move her. Just a few days before her eighteenth birthday, she had met a prince from the neighboring kingdom of Fakesuperia and they had got along like a house on fire. The early infatuation had no time to ponder over the differences and they had spent a lovely time together for over a year.  

As it happens with maturing relationships, their time together led to fading of the early infatuation and the discussions became for substantive. They started discussing areas of belief, principles and ways of bringing up the children and the differences that were as stark as day and night soon became apparent. She, of a tolerating nature, was ready to forgo all her principles that could have alienated her from her roots but was not willing to decide the fate of their children even before they were born.  

“The children should decide for themselves. I cannot do injustice to them by deciding their fate by my whims. I can sacrifice everything for you but can’t sacrifice anything on behalf of my children. They would be born of free will.” she said, one day when the topic was being discussed.  

“What non-sense! Will I, as a father, do any injustice to my children? Don’t I know what is good for them? Do you mean to say that my principles are wrong?” he retorted angrily.  

“You don’t understand. Its not about the principles, it’s the right of choice!”  

The prince, like a stub-born etch on a stone, left without bidding adieu and the distance grew over the course of time. The princess started behaving differently and was much a different person from her normal self. From now I would care only about fun and no emotions in a relationship, she told herself. In search of that fun which was devoid of happiness, she bumped into another prince from the kingdom of Diversia. Soon, they started having long discussions which started off as childish and turned meaningful with every passing day. The princess learnt that this prince had a very similar relationship history which made her pity him and perhaps it was only pity and no love that they bonded over. The princess was happy with her new found relationship but she was always uneasy thinking about her first love. She wanted to embrace the future but could not let go the past and it was this fickle-mindedness that prompted the prince of Diversia to express his emotions to the princess on a cloudy, stormy day.  

“You have helped me salvage my life from the depth of ruins I had gotten myself in after a failed foray in the realm of love. You had gotten me back on my feet after I was left kneeling painfully on my knees. You are everything to me and your happiness is of far greater significance to me than my own. So…” he said stumbling “if you think that you would be happier with your past love, I pray and beg you to leave me without feeling guilty for pity is not love and I would rather have you be happy rather than me not being sad. Please go back to your love if it indeed is oh gracious, kind-hearted princess.”  

The prince of Diversia left not to be seen again by her ever. She pondered hard over going back to the past but the future of her children stopped her in her steps. She tried to find the prince of Diversia again but he was long gone. The princess’ fickle-mindedness had left with a past that she could not return to and a future which was no longer waiting for her. 

 This is a work of fiction produced on a day of intense pressure.

[samplepiece]

Poems that have had a profound impact on me

By the time I was in the ninth standard, I had read a number of English poems in the standard text books and only two, Daffodils by Wordsworth and To Daffodils by Herrick, had had some kind of impact on me. But in the ninth standard, I was exposed to these three poems that have made me a thinker over the years.  The first was Lord Alfred Tennyson's 'A Farewell'. "Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea, Thy tribute wave deliver: No more by thee my steps shall be, For ever and for ever. Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea, A rivulet then a river: Nowhere by thee my steps shall be For ever and for ever. But here will sigh thine alder tree And here thine aspen shiver; And here by thee will hum the bee, For ever and for ever. A thousand suns will stream on thee, A thousand moons will quiver; But not by thee my steps shall be, For ever and for ever. " The poet was asking the small rivulet flowing by to carry on in its course and do its job as always. He stressed that he won't be there forever to overlook the rivulet.  It made me think more of our mortal nature and the relative immortality of the nature around us. I recall spending many nights weeping under the pillow. The second was James Shirley's 'Death The Leveller'. "THE glories of our blood and state  Are shadows, not substantial things;  There is no armour against Fate;  Death lays his icy hand on kings:  Sceptre and Crown  Must tumble down,  And in the dust be equal made  With the poor crooked scythe and spade.  Some men with swords may reap the field,  And plant fresh laurels where they kill:  But their strong nerves at last must yield;  They tame but one another still:  Early or late  They stoop to fate,  And must give up their murmuring breath  When they, pale captives, creep to death.  The garlands wither on your brow,  Then boast no more your mighty deeds!  Upon Death's purple altar now  See where the victor-victim bleeds.  Your heads must come  To the cold tomb:  Only the actions of the just  Smell sweet and blossom in their dust. " The poem spoke of death as the great leveller that treated the kings and peasants alike; a mighty force in face of which every body, weak and strong, rich and poor, stood helpless.  This was one way of looking at death and the one that had seemed to magnify the dread that death brought a hundred times. The third was John Donne's 'Deat Be Not Proud' "Death be not proud, though some have called thee Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not soe, For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow, Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill mee. From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee, Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow, And soonest our best men with thee doe goe, Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie. Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men, And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell, And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well, And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then? One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally, And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die." The poem, unlike the previous two, challenged death's ultimate powers. It argued that death does nothing that poppy or some other charm couldn't do and at best, death causes a sleep that only leads to an eternal awakening; and once death has had its way with all, it was death that would die the ultimate death. :)

[samplepiece]

Whatever we witness today in the international political arena has been identically manifested in the 19th tournament of the World Cup. Those countries which played a key role in imposing new sanctions against Iran -- like England, America and France -- were all eliminated in the preliminary phases

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki was quoted as saying by Iran's official news agency IRNA. I have been under a self-imposed ban on writing, and writing blogs in particular. But quotes like the one above that, that encompass an amazing sense of observation, give great insight into the ways of the Lord, and how justice is done! Now don't you all see how wrong America, England and France were in imposing sanctions of Iran. So, to teach them a lesson, God made them fail in the World Cup. Had they been on the right side (that is on Iran's side), surely they all would have won this world cup! (By the way, din't Brazil, Germany, Spain also vote against Iran at the UN?) Now, only the nation on the right path (i.e. Iran) can win the world cup. Oh, they haven't even qualified for it? Well, it does give some insight into the ways of Lord, indeed! If only the foreign ministers of world could think before they spoke.. but then, if only horses could fly!