Smiles 7 x 7 x 7 x 7

Books soothe the soul. Fill my hours with pleasant activity. Teach me things. And long after reading a book. my thoughts revolve around it for years to come, especially if it has made an impact. I love how I interpret some books in different ways over the passage of time. I like to think I grow wiser and am able to understand better, see the nuances I may not have noticed earlier.

So when I saw last week’s writing prompt, Mi, I was excited. I thought, hey, here’s one I am going to love. And instead of diving right into it, I noticed there was a week’s time and put it off. What with one thing and another, I think I got a little disoriented about the day / time the linky would close.

I visited someone’s blog today to read her response to the prompt. And happily anticipated writing my own post. Then, hours later, saw the next prompt go up. What? I rushed over to the blog hosting the linky to find that I was locked out with “Collection closed”. Lesson learned, I thought. Serves me right, I thought.

So how come I am here, you ask? Great question. Because I have a lovely answer. I just decided to go ahead and write it. As if in response, the Universe informed me that there could be a chance to still take part in this linky. Lucky eh?

So here’s the prompt:
Grab the 7th book from your bookshelf. = it is a novel by Robert Littell titled “The Defection of A J Lewinter”

Open it up to page 7. Pinpoint the 7th sentence on the page.= “A smile spread across his face”

Begin a poem/a piece of prose that begins with that sentence
Limit it in length to 7 lines/7 sentences.

Here we go!

A smile spread across his face as they told him the good news.
Suddenly, the sun seemed brighter and parched earth seemed to be smiling with him.
Their attempt to dig a well had finally borne fruit and yielded a steady trickle of water, sweet water that was rapidly gaining force.
It meant that they would no longer have to walk a few miles to the neighboring town and haggle for a pot of water that seemed to evaporate with every step they took on their way home.
It meant that the fields would be green again and the fragrance of flowers would fill the air.
Perseverance pays, he thought.
Suddenly he felt like a young lad again and was tempted to join the little boys celebrating the miracle, dancing under the strong spout of water.

Ah, that felt good, indeed.

Confession: The seventh book on my bookshelf was in Tamil – a book by a fabulous author Sujatha. So I picked the one next to it!