Mira Prabhu's Blog, page 83
September 3, 2014
From the small dog
Love doggies? Read this! The dog in the picture resembles my very own Kali Devi…no coincidence because she’s very much like the adorable canine in this hilarious poem…thank you Sue Vincent, Chris Graham and Lewis Carroll!
Originally posted on Daily Echo:
“The time has come,” the doglet said,
“to talk of many things;
Of tennis balls and squeaky ducks,
and sneaky bees with stings;
of why the sparrows fly so fast
and if that cat has wings.”
“Just wait a bit,” the writer said,
“I’m busy with these things.”
“But writer,“ said the small dog then,
“The sun will shortly set,
the pheasants will be playing out,
and rabbits too, I bet.
I really should be practising,
I haven’t caught one yet.”
“Hmm. Never mind, it’s raining
and you don’t like getting wet.”
“Ok then,” sighed the little dog,
“We could consider, please,
the therapeutic benefits
of sharing Cheddar cheese.
Or why that spider’s sitting there,
Or why do you have knees…”
“You scratch a lot,” the writer said,
“You sure it isn’t fleas?”
The clouds were turning dusky pink,
Upon the fading blue.
The writer sighed, put down the pen
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September 2, 2014
Why read?
Why Read? See what an Arch Druidess has to say on this vital matter…thank you Chris for pointing the way!
Originally posted on Adventures and Musings of an Arch Druidess:
September 1, 2014
Dreams of the Future
Dream on…but make sense of the Big Dreams too…listen to your Inner Voice as you forge your future…thank you Steven Fox!
Originally posted on Dreams: Guide to the Soul:
While dreams can portray the past, it is the future they can help shape the most. Use “Dreams: Guide to the Soul” at http://www.drstevenfox.com as a map to help find the future your subconscious wants you to have. (This was the World Press photo of the year.)
August 31, 2014
Monday Funnies – In colour but only background music!
Start your week off right with Irish Comedian Dave Allen…courtesy The Story Reading Ape…
Originally posted on Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog..... An Author Promotions Enterprise!:
This week we have Irish Comedian Dave Allen :D
The Tragedies of Mary Shelley
Fascinating to delve into the unbelievable tragedies that scarred the life of a famous female writer from another time — the author of no less than FRANKENSTEIN…wow and thank you Art Lake and the Story-Reading Ape…
Originally posted on A R T L▼R K:
On the 30th of August 1797, English novelist Mary (Wollstonecraft) Shelley was born in London. She was the wife and muse of Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley, daughter of political philosopher William Godwin and of philosopher and feminist Mary Wollstonecraft. Short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer, she was most famous for her Gothic novel Frankenstein (1818). Much of Mary Godwin’s personal life was fraught with misfortune and grief. Almost as soon as she had given literary birth to her hideous creature Frankenstein, her world began to disintegrate.
Tragedy was present very early on in Mary’s life when she lost her mother at only eleven days of age. After her publication of Frankenstein, however, something akin to a curse seems to have descended on her circles. In 1816, Mary’s troubled half-sister Fanny Imlay Godwin checked herself in to a hotel in Wales and committed suicide with…
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August 29, 2014
Appointment with Shiva…
One recent morning I was riding to Ramana Ashram along Bangalore Road when I saw ahead of me a stationary public bus and a swelling crowd, including policemen and their vehicles—clustering around a white female lying motionless in a vermilion pool of blood on the side of the road. From a distance she looked so like a close friend of mine that I let loose a silent scream and involuntarily hit the brakes—right in the middle of the road.
A grim policeman waved me over to the side. I obeyed like a robot, struck dumb by a mélange of dark emotions. A cop who seemed to be in charge asked if I knew the dead girl—he wanted me to identify her. They had no clue, of course, what a coward I am in certain visceral ways. Too shaken to look at her face, I suggested instead that we identify her by inspecting the contents of her bag. Inside her faded cloth bag, we found a diary and a cell phone. And so we discovered that the name of this lovely girl, killed by a bus driver in a lethal hurry to reach his destination, was Miriam Franziska, and that she had recently arrived here from Berlin in order to savor the varied pleasures of Tiruvannamalai.
The last time I had witnessed such a death was as a teenager in Bangalore, when, right before my horrified eyes, a lorry hit a motorbike head-on: a sight ghastly beyond description because the victim flew into the air with the impact. I had screamed then too, and closed my eyes for long moments, although I was driving and my little nephew was with me. Fortunately our guardian angels too were hovering, or there would surely have been more fatalities due to my unhinged behavior.
Coming on top of so many deaths in my personal life—two beloved brothers who died in separate tragic accidents, both my parents, several close friends, a surrogate mother who suffered a fatal heart attack while driving her car in Washington DC, and more who shall remain nameless—I find that I have become both immunized to distant death and highly vulnerable to the passing of those whose lives come to an end so abruptly and brutally.
This twenty-three year old had made a note about a yoga class she planned to take on the second page of her diary…this is what I think I saw anyway, since my eyes were blurred with tears. It was a class she never would take, I remember thinking bleakly. So much unfinished business…so many joys and sorrows missed…and yet, her physical existence came to end in the shadow of the sacred hill Arunachala, whom millions consider the living embodiment of the Great God Shiva, the Destroyer in the Indian pantheon. It is said that to die here is a wondrous blessing…which leaves me with the lingering thought that only the Omniscient know for sure why the Destroyer stole back this beauty’s soul in so cruel a fashion—in the time and the place that He did. In the world of the Spirit, there are no accidents.
I have been praying for her family ever since—I know from personal experience that it is blood relatives who suffer the most excruciating knife thrusts of grief. Spirits set free by Death, unless reborn instantly, are no longer subject to the pangs of earthly life; it is the ones left behind who have to come to terms with their passing. My heart goes out to all those who will miss the living flame of Miriam’s presence.
Later that day, I thought of a young woman who is still trying to make peace with a tragedy that happened over a decade ago. She is alive and breathing and definitely on a spiritual path, and yet she refuses to speak or connect with other humans; her constant unrelieved mourning has turned her into a zombie. And this vital young Berliner, who had probably lived life to the fullest and yearned to plunge into more rich adventure, is no more in her physical body. Such is the irony of life on this incredibly disturbing planet.
Ultimately death is a wake-up call to make the most of our precious human lives—for no one but the sage knows when the end will come. As Don Juan said to Carlos Castaneda, we must live as if Death is looking over our shoulder; far from being morbid, this is the most perfect advice a spiritual master can provide.
Buddhists have a Death Meditation covered in three simple points: 1) that death is certain for all beings; 2) that the time of death is uncertain—babies die, teenagers die, adults die, the old die—we have no fixed lifespan; 3) and that when we die, all that remains is our eternal consciousness. The point, of course, is to focus on what is truly important while we still have a physical instrument at our disposal—rather than to waste our incredible potential by, say, amassing wealth or seeking fame and status in an ephemeral world.
It made me so happy to hear from a friend who knew Miriam and admired her artwork (yes, Miriam was an artist and a singer) that she was a gentle and talented woman who was certainly not wasting her time on earth. Her passing makes me realize yet again why it is vitally important that I watch how I live—for as I live, so shall I die. May Arunachala hold you in his embrace, beloved Miriam, and whisk you away to a realm of consciousness way beyond all mortal concerns.
Greetings from the sacred mountain Arunachala, who reveals to those who are willing to transcend the mundane that we are much more than body, mind, emotions and personal history—that we are no less than the Absolute, the Self, whose nature is pure existence, pure consciousness and pure bliss!
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August 27, 2014
Beware The Future – It’s Closer than You Think. What The Internet of Things Means For Indie Authors. Part 1.
The Internet of Things…an intimidating future for a non-techie comme moi…what do you think?
Originally posted on Ebook Bargains UK Blog:
The problem with the future is, its coming up behind you. You can never be quite sure how far away it is, and you can never be quite sure whether it will sweep you up with it, sweep by and leave you behind, or just run right over you.
Over at the Motley Fool recently they ran this snippet from an old copy of Newsweek. From February 1995.
In it one Newsweek journalist opined,
“Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries, and multimedia classrooms… [They say] we’ll soon buy books and newspapers straight over the Internet. Uh, sure. The truth is no online database will replace your daily newspaper…
“We’re promised instant catalog shopping — just point and click for great deals. We’ll order airline tickets over the network, make restaurant reservations and negotiate sales contracts. Stores will become obsolete. So how come my local mall does more…
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August 23, 2014
The Joys of Editing
Christine Plouvier addresses the joys (!) of editing a novel here…read it and you will know why I’m always looking for terrific beta readers. If you think you could be one (an intelligent reader who provides honest feedback on a polished draft) , let me know. Krishna’s Counsel, my second novel, metaphysical crime fiction, set in both India and Manhattan, will be ready for beta readers before long…
Originally posted on Christine Plouvier, Novelist:
Writing gurus repeatedly issue august pronouncements, such as, “Professional editing is not a luxury, it’s a necessity.” The perception seems to be that “Indie Author” means “Independently wealthy but foolishly stingy dilettante scribbler.” Nothing could be further from the truth.
The going rate for editing is 1½ to 2 cents (that’s $0.015 to $0.02 USD) per word, paid in advance. Depending on whose counter is used, IrishFirebrands clocks in at 196,131 to 199,230 words. Anyone can do the math, even without a calculator. The editing fee would be on top of three years of writing labor without pay (plus research expenses); and, mind you, this is for a service that bears the caveat that no guarantee or warranty will be made as to the subsequent merchantability of the manuscript.
This writer happens to be a pensioner who is living far below the poverty line, and hiring an editor would…
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August 19, 2014
The Folly of Expert Opinions
The Folly of Expert Opinions…check out Violet’s fun blog…and thanks to The Story Reading Ape for leading me to it…
Originally posted on Violet's Veg*n e-Comics:
There was a time, long long ago
When they thought the world was flat.
They worried if they sailed the seas
They’d fall off the end of that.
In centuries past, in primitive times,
They demonized herbal healers.
They’d label such gifted folk a witch.
Fear and ignorance led to murders.
1908, the Siberian tundra
Was struck by a freak fireball.
Theories abound, though no cause has been found.
Was it meteorite or black-hole?
10,000 crop circles in various forms
Have appeared since ’72
Caused by UFOs, wind or rabbits or hoax?
Who knows who knows? Do you?
And now here we are, Twenty-Fourteen,
A much more enlightened era.
The experts tell us as the ice starts to melt,
That we should try to live more greener.
Thoughtful, conscientious, sensible types
Recycle their plastic and drive less.
They walk or take the bus to work;
Use low wattage bulbs; try…
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August 18, 2014
Losing Robin Williams—The Dark Side of Those Who Make Us Laugh
This profound post re-blogged courtesy Kristen Lamb reminds me of an old tale. Here’s my version: a glittering throng of aristocrats watch a formidable and obese Dame dressed in sparkling jewels and crushed crimson velvet make her majestic descent down a winding marble stairway…suddenly she trips and plummets all the way down those stairs. The crowd bursts into uproarious laughter…can’t blame them, the sight is so funny…but the laughter stops when they discover she is dead…yes, in this world of duality, tragedy is often the other side of comedy.
Originally posted on Kristen Lamb's Blog:
Suicide. It’s a topic that’s been on most of our minds as of late. I was BROKEN when I found out about Robin Williams. It’s like this bright shining star just snuffed out, leaving only a black hole of crushing emptiness behind. I feel terrible for taking him for granted, selfishly assuming he’d always be around.
I haven’t yet cried because I’m afraid I might not stop. My fondest childhood memories involve Mork & Mindy. Growing up, I’d watch Williams’ comedic acts over and over and over, studying his timing and how he could do what he did, because to me? It was MAGIC. In fact, I can honestly say he was my earliest mentor. I learned to laugh and make others laugh, and, since home and school were living nightmares, laughter was my lifeline.
I’m no expert aside from having suicide issues in the family. Also, years ago, I…
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