When Great Trees Fall Poem by Maya Angelou

When Great Trees Fall

     - by Maya Angelou

When great trees fall,

Rocks on distant hills shudder,

Lions hunker down in tall grasses,

And even elephants lumber after safety.

When great trees fall in forests,

Small things recoil into silence,

Their senses eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die,

The air around us becomes

Light, rare, sterile.

We breathe, briefly.

Our eyes, briefly,see with a hurtful clarity.

Our memory, suddenly sharpened,

Examines, gnaws on kind words

Unsaid, promised walks never taken.

Great souls die and our reality, 

Bound to them, takes leave of us.

Our souls, dependent upon their nurture,

Now shrink, wizened.

Our minds, formed

And informed by their radiance, fall away.

We are not so much maddened

As reduced to the unutterable ignorance

Of dark, cold caves.

And when great souls die,

After a period peace blooms,

Slowly and always irregularly. 

Spaces fill with a kind of

Soothing electric vibration.

Our senses, restored, never

To be the same, whisper to us.

They existed. They existed.

We can be. 

Be and be better. 

For they existed.

Ten Easy Riddles for Kids Part II

Hope you enjoyed part one of the riddles for kids. These riddles with answers are seriously silly and yet fun. You may make faces while reading them, but trust me not everyone can guess the answers in first try. You definitely need to scratch your heads for few of these questions. Enjoy!

Ten Easy Riddles for Kids

Q.1 What has many keys but can't open any door?

Ans. A keyboard


Q.2 What has killed elephants, defeated lions and attacked soldiers, but yet gets imprisoned in the spider's web?

Ans. A housefly


Q.3 What everyone of us has and can never lose it?

Ans. A shadow


Q.4 What goes up and doesn't come back down?

Ans. Your age


Q.5  What type of fish can never swim?

Ans. Dead Fish


Q.6 What has two banks but no money?

Ans. River


Q.7 What type of bed can fly?

Ans. A bed bug


Q.8 What is the center of Gravity?

Ans. The letter V


Q.9 Which letter of the alphabet has the most water?

Ans. The letter 'C'


Q.10 What comes in the center of American and Australia?

Ans. The letter 'r'

Ten Easy Riddles for Kids Part I

Kids love riddles. They enjoy thinking about the answer and challenging friends with riddles. Such silly yet head scratching questions are always enjoyable and can be a great way to spend quality time with kids.  Here are ten riddles that are easy and fun.

Ten Easy Riddles for Kids

Q. 1  What do policeman apply on their bread?

Ans. Traffic jam


Q.2  Who drinks water and dies?

Ans. Fire


Q.3  Who looks like half chopped apple?

Ans. Other half of apple


Q.4  Two rooms in which we can't enter?

Ans. Mushroom and Broom


Q.5  Which is the brightest day of the week?

Ans. Sunday


Q.6  Who has a head but cannot think?

Ans. Coin


Q.7  Which city shocks you?

Ans. Electricity


Q.8  What can run but has no feet?

Ans. River


Q.9  What has a face and two hands but no legs?

Ans. Clock


Q.10  What has thumb and four fingers but is not a living thing?

Ans. A glove

I Will Be There Poem

Nice lines and beautiful poem. Even just listening to this makes you feel good. As if somebody is there for you! 

I Will Be There Poem

       

       -By Unknown

Whenever you're sad,

or feeling blue,

Just call on me.

I'll be here for you.

Whenever you're happy,

or feeling sad,

Just call on me.

You are going to be glad that you had.

Cause I'm gonna be there

with open arms.

I'm going to be there

to bear your arms.

I may be young,

or tiny like a bug,

but when you're sad

I swear to God,

I give the biggest hugs.

So when you're lonely

or just plain blue,

Just think of me,

And I'll come to you.

Dear Little Tree Poem

Beautiful poem about planting tree ! Just came across recently. Don't know who is the poet, but words are beautifully written. I have named the poem - Dear Little Tree..

Dear Little Tree Poem

        - By Anonymous

Dear little tree that we plant today,

What will you be when we're old and gray?"

The saving bank of the squirrel and mouse,

For robin and wren an apartment house.

The dressing room of the butterfly's ball,

The locust's and katydid's concert hall.

The schoolboy's ladder in happy May,

The schoolgirl's tent on a holiday.

And my leaves shall whisper them merrily,

A tale of the children who planted me.

Expansion of Idea - Speech is the Gift of All, But Thought of Few

Human beings are very fortunate compared to other animals. One of the best things that happened to us is the speech. Speech is a gift which allows us to express our feelings, convey ideas, speak and communicate with others. The freedom of speech has allowed us to express and debate about our opinions on things. Talking has thus come naturally to us. Few use it in a good and wise way while for few it is just about talking without thinking.

Though all of us have the skill of reasoning, very few actually make use of it. Being rational is not everyone's cup of it. Thinking before speaking is actually foreign to few people. And all this results to what can be expected from such people - bunch of words spoken out without giving any thought to it. Decisions are made without worrying about the consequences of it. The thoughtless words are said and then paid heavily later.

But not everyone sail in the same boat. Some people actually think before saying. These people take their thoughts into consideration and make rational assessment of it. They worry about the consequences and speak wisely. The outcome of speech for such people are always worthwhile. This is because they are never reckless. Hence man should use the power of thinking before making a speech. Think more and speak less should be the motto of one's life. Because whatever you speak is the result of one's thinking. 

5 Amazing Facts about Puffin Bird

Puffins are pelagic seabirds that feed on fish which they catch by diving in the water. They have black and white feathers and a large and colorful beak(shaped more like parrot's beak). Puffin birds are found in three species, out of which two species the tufted puffin and horned puffin are found in the North Pacific Ocean where as the Atlantic puffin is found in the North Atlantic Ocean.

Atlantic Puffin

5 Amazing Facts About Puffin Birds 

1. Many misinterpret puffin bird with penguins. This could be because they share the same black and white body color. Penguins have black and white skin coat, while puffins have black and white feathers. One more similarity between both penguin and puffin bird is their love for eating fish. But penguins are penguins and puffins are birds. Penguins have wings but can't fly, but puffins are seabirds that fly. They don't even belong to the same family. While penguins belong to the family Spheniscidae, puffin bird belongs to family Alcidae.

2. Puffin birds always breed in large colonies usually on coastal cliffs or offshore islands. They nest in burrows(empty rabbit burrows), or even in rock crevices. They are found in a much larger number and mostly the areas or islands they breed are referred to as Puffin Islands.

Tufted Puffin

3. After the breeding season, puffin birds shed the colorful part of their beak leaving it to look dull and small.  Only during the breeding season the puffin birds have a colorful beak.

4. Puffins feed on fishes like herring, capelin, hake etc and also zooplankton. They have this unique ability to hold and carry as many as dozen small fishes at a time crosswise in their bill.

5. Puffins have the ability of swimming underwater as well as fly in the air. Their webbed feet enables them to swim effortlessly underwater, where they catch many fishes at a time.