Flamingo Poem Chapter 3 Keeping Quiet English - Flamingo Poem Chapter 3 Keeping Quiet

Perhaps the Earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive.
Now I'll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go.

If we were not so single - minded
about keeping our lives moving, and for once could do nothing.
perhaps a huge silence might interrupt this sadness of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about;
I want no truck with death.

Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victory with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

Fishermen in the cold sea
would not harm whales and the man gathering salt
would look at his hurt hands.

What will counting up to twelve and keeping still help us achieve?

What is the ‘sadness’ that the poet refers to in the poem?

What does Neruda mean by ‘an exotic moment without rush’ in his poem, ‘Keeping Quiet’?

What symbol from Nature does the poet invoke to say that there can be life under apparent stillness?

Give two reasons why, according to Pablo Neruda, is ‘keeping quiet’ essential to attaining a better, more peaceful world.

What will ‘counting up to twelve and keeping still’ help us to achieve?

Which symbol from nature does the poet invoke that there can be life under apparent stillness?

‘Life is what it is all about.’ How is Keeping Quiet related to life?

Why does one feel a sudden strangeness on counting to twelve and keeping quiet?

How will keeping quiet protect our environment?