Think about this #1

My camera's charging and I'm too lazy to upload my photos and talk about my Malaysia trip now. So I shall blog about an entry from Joyce's blog.

About the Malay man who had died while retrieving his fish trap. The same man who was an expert scuba-diver and who had once saved someone from drowning. How and why could this happen? Joyce pondered about the frailties of life and honestly, I felt the same way too when I read this news. And also news about the family in southern Thailand who were brutally gunned down (adults, children and all) by terrorists because the father decided to quit the group.

There are 2 ways to live one's life, 2 ways to look at life, both exemplified by the 2 poems I'll share with you below:

Poem 1: Solitude (by Ella Wheeler Wilcox)
Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go.
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all, --
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life's gall.

Poem 2: If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking (by Emily Dickinson)
If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one faintin robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

* * * *
I believe Mr Abdul Khalid Talib lived his life the second way. May he rest in peace.

I believe you can choose to live your life in solitude, like Poem #1, and see life as thankless, vanity of vanities and a curse in which we must live out. Or you can choose not to live it in vain. What do you think?