Success....

Hero's Journey

"Success is a journey, not a destination." -- Ben Sweetland

"The ladder of success is best climbed by stepping on the rungs of opportunity." -- Ayn Rand




" Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other thing." -- Abraham Lincoln





Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. -Albert Shweitzer




The ideals which have lighted me on my way and time after time given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Truth, Goodness, and Beauty. . . . The ordinary objects of human endeavour -- property, outward success, luxury -- have always seemed to me contemptible.
- Albert Einstein


Making your mark on the world is hard. If it were easy, everybody would do it. But it's not. It takes patience, it takes commitment, and it comes with plenty of failure along the way. The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won't. it's whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.
- Barack Obama

पुष्प की अभिलाषा ...

Photo : Roses in my Garden

पुष्प की अभिलाषा

चाह नहीं मैं सुरबाला के गहनों में गूँथा जाऊँ

चाह नहीं, प्रेमी-माला में बिंध प्यारी को ललचाऊँ

चाह नहीं, सम्राटों के शव पर हे हरि, डाला जाऊँ

चाह नहीं, देवों के सिर पर चढ़ूँ भाग्य पर इठलाऊँ

मुझे तोड़ लेना वनमाली उस पथ पर देना तुम फेंक

मातृभूमि पर शीश चढ़ाने जिस पर जावें वीर अनेक ।।

- माखन लाल चतुर्वेदी




I remember a school time poem by famous Hindi poet Shri Makhan Lal Chaturvedi. An unforgettable poem about the aspiration of a flower.

Memories...

Memories

Memories are heartbeats
Sounding through the years
Echoes never fading
Of our smiles and our tears.
Moments that are captured
Sometimes unaware
Pictured in an album
Or a lock of hair.

Images that linger
Deep within the mind
Bit of verse we cherished
Once upon a time.
Through the musty hallways
Of the days we knew
Ever comes the vision
Beautiful and true.

Memories are roses
Blooming evermore
Full of fragrant sweetness
Never known before.
Life must have a meaning
Goals for which to strive
Memories are lights that burn
To keep the heart alive.

(Grace E. Easley)

On the Nature of Love ...

I see that instant I fall in love with...

The night is black and the forest has no end;
a million people thread it in a million ways.
We have trysts to keep in the darkness,
but where or with whom- of that we are unaware.
But we have this faith- that a lifetime's bliss
will appear any minute, with a smile upon its lips.
Scents, touches, sounds, snatches of songs brush us,
pass us, give us delightful shocks.
Then peradventure there's a flash of lightning:
whomever I see that instant I fall in love with.
I call that person and cry:
'This life is blest! For your sake such miles have I traversed!'
All those others who come close and
moved off in the darkness - I dont know if they exist or not.

From Chaitali (1896) -Rabindranath Tagore

A Tear And A Smile

A Tear And A Smile

I would not exchange the sorrows of my heart
For the joys of the multitude.
And I would not have the tears that sadness makes
To flow from my every part turn into laughter.

I would that my life remain a tear and a smile.

A tear to purify my heart and give me understanding
Of life's secrets and hidden things.
A smile to draw me nigh to the sons of my kind and
To be a symbol of my glorification of the gods.

A tear to unite me with those of broken heart;
A smile to be a sign of my joy in existence.

I would rather that I died in yearning and longing than that I live Weary and despairing.

I want the hunger for love and beauty to be in the
Depths of my spirit,for I have seen those who are
Satisfied the most wretched of people.
I have heard the sigh of those in yearning and Longing, and it is sweeter than the sweetest melody.

With evening's coming the flower folds her petals
And sleeps, embracingher longing.
At morning's approach she opens her lips to meet
The sun's kiss.

The life of a flower is longing and fulfilment.
A tear and a smile.

The waters of the sea become vapor and rise and come
Together and area cloud.

And the cloud floats above the hills and valleys
Until it meets the gentle breeze, then falls weeping
To the fields and joins with brooks and rivers to Return to the sea, its home.

The life of clouds is a parting and a meeting.
A tear and a smile.

And so does the spirit become separated from
The greater spirit to move in the world of matter
And pass as a cloud over the mountain of sorrow
And the plains of joy to meet the breeze of death
And return whence it came.

To the ocean of Love and Beauty----to God.

- Khalil Gibran

Cuckoo - The Song Bird...

To the Cuckoo

O blithe newcomer! I have heard, I hear thee and rejoice: O Cuckoo! shall I call thee bird, Or but a wandering Voice? While I am lying on the grass Thy twofold shout I hear; From hill to hill it seems to pass, At once far off and near. Though babbling only to the vale Of sunshine and of flowers, Thou bringest unto me a tale Of visionary hours. Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring! Even yet thou art to me No bird, but an invisible thing, A voice, a mystery; The same whom in my schoolboy days I listened to; that Cry Which made me look a thousand ways In bush, and tree, and sky. To seek thee did I often rove Through woods and on the green; And thou wert still a hope, a love; Still longed for, never seen! And I can listen to thee yet; Can lie upon the plain And listen, till I do beget That golden time again. O blessed birth! the earth we pace Again appears to be An unsubstantial, fairy place, That is fit home for Thee! -William Wordsworth It's the Spring Time here. The trees are covered with fresh leaves. A variety of birds could be seen here .Every morning becomes melodious by the sound of cuckoo. I wake up everyday with their sweet sound. No sound can be sweeter than than the sound of Cuckoo !

Rose..

Oh, my luve’s like a red, red rose,

That ’s newly sprung in June;

Oh, my luve’s like the melodie

That’s sweetly played in tune.

- Robert Burns

A Rose is a Rose is a Rose ...

Photo - Roses in my garden

When the lamp is shattered...

When the lamp is shattered
The light in the dust lies dead -
When the cloud is scattered,
The rainbow's glory is shed.
When the lute is broken,
Sweet tones are remembered not;
When the lips have spoken,
Loved accents are soon forgot.

As music and splendour
Survive not the lamp and the lute,
The heart's echoes render
No song when the spirit is mute -
No song but sad dirges,
Like the wind through a ruined cell,
Or the mournful surges
That ring the dead seaman's knell.

When hearts have once mingled,
Love first leaves the well-built nest;
The weak one is singled
To endure what it once possessed.
O Love! who bewailest
The frailty of all things here,
Why choose you the frailest
For your cradle, your home, and your bier?

Its passions will rock thee,
As the storms rock the ravens on high;
Bright reason will mock thee,
Like the sun from a wintry sky.
From thy nest every rafter
Will rot, and thine eagle home
Leave thee naked to laughter,
When leaves fall and cold winds come.

- P B Shelley