The Raven
by Edgar Allan Poe


 Church Going
by Philip Larkin


 Frost at Midnight
by Samuel Coleridge


 I sit & look out
by Walt Whitman


 The Lady of Shallot
by Alfred Lord Tennyson


 Telephone Conversation
by Wole Soyinka


 Going Places
by A.R. Barton


 Village Cricket Match
by A. G. Macdonell


 The Night Train at Deoli
by Ruskin Bond


 Growing Up
by Joyce Cary


 The Castaway
by Rabindranath Tagore


Page 2


Frost At Midnight
-by Samuel Coleridge

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(Continued from Page 1)

All these warm memories of his native place stirred a strange pleasure in him with a lingering sensation and filled him with a thrill of uncontrollable joy that was singular, rare and unrestrained.
As a child, the pleasant things he dreamt of soon lulled him off to sleep and his 'sleep prolonged his dreams'. Even the next morning, they remained with him and he grew quite indifferent to the class work. However, intimidated by the stern glance of the headmaster, he would continue to fix his look upon the book, but the letters would make no meaning to him. As soon as the door half opened, he would snatch a hasty glance to catch a familiar face appearing at the door-

Townsman, or aunt, or sister more beloved, My playmate when we both were clothed alike!

The poet vows that his son's childhood will be spent in far happier surroundings than his, intensely aware as he is of the gentle breathing of his child sleeping beside him, in the momentary pauses of his thought.
He recalls how he had been brought up in the great city, 'amid cloister dim, and saw nought lovely but the sky and stars' and had spent his childhood in the confines of the college corridors. It gives him great joy to think that his son shall 'wander like a breeze' with uncontrolled joy by the lakes and the sandy shores, beneath the crags of ancient mountains and beneath the clouds. He will thereby comprehend the language of God in the nature's sound and melody.

'God utters, who from eternity doth teach; Himself in all and all in Himself.'

The poet feels that God, the universal teacher who manifests his grace in the bounty and beauty of nature. The poet's son shall imbibe a natural curiosity for the lovely objects of nature and the craving to learn more shall enable him to acquire greater knowledge, thereby also enriching the soul and gaining a spiritual growth.

Whether summer clothe the general earth With greenness or the redbreast sit and sing.

Thus all seasons with their characteristic charms and delights will be dear to his son. Summer with its green foliage will have for him as great an appeal as winter when the red-breast bird sits on the bare branches of the mossy apple tree and sings.

Or if the secret ministry of frost Shall hang them up in silent icicles, Quietly shining to the Moon.

While the accumulated snow on the 'night thatch' falls and thaw. He will equally appreciate the 'eve drops fall', distinctly audible int the lull of the storm or the frost silently freezing the water droplets into crystals of ice that shine to the quiet moonlight.
Like Wordsworth, Coleridge too believed that God pervades all objects of nature and the divine power manifests itself in all things of universe, just as all things have their being in Him.
The Companionship of nature brings real joy and solace to the human mind and nature indeed exercises a moral and educative influence on man's mind. Thus it is the poet's earnest desire that his son grows up in close communion with nature and treasure his childhood memories forever.

Page 2



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