Helen Keller | Mama Lisa's World Blog

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Feel the Breeze, Smell the Earth

Sunday, May 3rd, 2009

The noiseless little noises of earth
Come with softest rustle;
The shy, sweet feet of life;
The silky flutter of moth-wings
Against my restraining palm;
The strident beat of insect-wings,
The silvery trickle of water;
Little breezes busy in the summer grass;
The music of crisp, whisking, scurrying leaves,
The swirling, wind-swept, frost-tinted leaves;
The crystal splash of summer rain,
Saturate with the odors of the sod…

With alert fingers I listen
To the showers of sound
That the wind shakes from the forest.
I bathe in the liquid shade
Under the pines, where the air hangs cool
After the shower is done…

This lovely passage was written By H. Keller. Many of us have preconceived notions about Helen… having grown up with hearing her story. This passage, gives a different perspective, of living life through feeling… feeling subtle things that we don’t normally pay attention to, but that were Helen’s whole world. The idea of noise as felt through a rustle… The idea of silver as imagined through the feel of a trickle of water. Shade being simply the feeling of cool air on your body… the smell of sod, the forest after the rain.

What a lovely passage!

You can read the whole text this comes from online. It’s called A Chant of Darkness from the book, The World I Live In (1910). If you click on the PDF, it starts on page 183.

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