Won't you allow yourself to be seduced by local metaphors/similes

Some time ago in 2010, I invited my readers to exercise their grey cells and come up with metaphors and similes from their immediate environs - in short, local and regional similes/images and metaphors. Well, we did try to come up with something and in the process tried to invent our own images! Well, I'm tempted to do something like that again and so I invite you to come up with unique metaphors and similes of your own and from your own locale. Let's be done away with those cliched, "As blind as an owl" and "as sly as a fox!"

Leaving you with some examples from the comments of the post I did in 2010.

~ "As it shifts out of sight, the birch trees and farms in my view become dark silhouettes on a canvas of silver. Like a gentle painter, the sun leaves behind brush strokes of warm colours on the evening sky for a short instance, before submerging us in dense darkness yet again, without any promises to return..."

(Zuzana Hansen)

 ~ "There was so much humidity in the air that photosynthesis threatened to become audible"

(Yuvika Chaube)

Okay, shall we begin? Here are some of mine:-

1. Her voice was as shrill as the Lapwing during monsoon
2. He became predictive as the words in the word document ;)
3. Your face is beaming as the smiley that my G-chat provides!
4. You are slowly becoming tasteless like the leftover dal that is three days old!
5. Her imaginary ghosts within were numerous than those found on the Tamarind tree in our village square!


Image 1: Internet
Image 2: Internet

Inside-out

She wanted this for a long time and finally it was coming. Quite excited and anxious, she prepared for the event.

The day came. She was allowed fifteen minutes. She was angry that she was not allotted the sixty minutes that she had asked for. They said: "First sit through for fifteen."

She was advised to sit in a wee corner and observe the entire process. She was thrilled. She pulled a chair and made herself cozy in a "nice" corner. The process was going on. It did not have an exact starting time. She was told that since there was no beginning and no end, it did not follow any plot. She was happy that she will not miss anything by not being there for the beginning.

She started listening, observing and . . .

She noticed restlessness, uneasiness, sudden happiness, blankness.

She stopped. She cursed herself for not bringing a book. She had asked for sixty minutes and got only fifteen minutes but it seemed like eternity.

Distracted, she tried to "think." She could not. The "process" was quite loud almost hijacking every other thing. "How could this be?" She tried to remove herself mentally from the scene and think of water and small boats but the "process" was almost suffocating her senses. She wanted to go. But it was only seven minutes. She had eight more left. She figured in the "process" many times. She wasn't interested. "Let me go." "Please let me leave this place."

Silence. This was her own asking. There was no escaping it now.

Finally but slowly the fifteen minutes were over.

She ran outside. She was wrapped in sweat. Life wouldn't be the same again.

The dream-stealer woke up. Many times she had imagined being inside the mind of someone and observe the processes of the mind sitting in a wee corner. She always wondered if that would be a romantic affair. But after the dream, she revised her thoughts. The dream-stealer finally dreamt and was glad she had seen a dream but unhappy that being inside the mind of someone was so terrifying.

Laced with degrees of comparison

Ever wondered how most of our conversation  has the mode of comparison laced at the subconscious level. Every time I remark: I like coffee, I am subconsciously saying that I like coffee better than tea or colas or better still vodka! The same applies for clothes, people and situations.

Now I start meandering into thought whether this is a social and cultural conditioning. Do we always look at people, objects and emotions in the comparison mode? When does an individual learn this: as a child or as an early adolescent who has some experience in life?

When babies cry while being fed with milk instead of orange juice, do they react to the taste because they don't find it as appealing or simply because it does not taste good. It's a wonder to observe all these nitty-gritties of life.

Just pause through your thoughts in a given time and observe yourself and think how many times your thoughts are based on comparison. When you decide to read instead of watching television, you compare; when you exclaim, "I love kissing!" you are comparing it with something else, say caressing; when you remark "I love this place," you are doing a fast mental comparison of different places and arriving at a conclusion.

Of course, along with all this, memory plays a pivotal role which aids in comparison and decisions.

And so what are the tales of comparison in your experiences . . .

An invitation to flirt with similes and metaphors

My preoccupation with similes and metaphors has heightened after reading the almost unusual ones used by Nevine in her writings. This has created in me a burning desire to try and jot down some similes and metaphors from my immediate vicinity which can be local. Many a times I find stale similes which have almost become cliched. Similes like "As light as a feather," "As pure as milk" have been around since god knows when.

Let them be.

I thought why don't I ask you to jog your Grey cells and try some similes and metaphors from your immediate environment. For example I just brushed my teeth and the thought that crossed my mind was: Sometimes thoughts have to be squeezed like paste from a paste tube. I don't know whether this is original but it definitely seemed better than the cliches.

So readers why don't you try something NOW and put them down as comments. It would be peculiar to your physical surroundings and YOURS. And I hope this has been created by you and is not a cliched one!

Shall we . . .

Image courtesy: Internet