Some blogging tips for protecting and if you wish for more visitors on your blog

Most of you know that I lost my Reading Room blog to malware. Yes, I did create another one in its place, Everything Distils with Reading. Of course I lost my links, ranking, readership and lot more which I had built over three years. Yes, I am getting there but slowly. Three years of work can’t be achieved in 50 days.

I explored and found very simple rules:

1) Have a back up. I find importing blogger blog to WordPress easy. Create a wordpress blog of the same name and import your blog to it, comments and all. You can do it on bloggers too but I found it cumbersome. Do whatever is easy and works for you.

2) Submit your blog to Google webmaster tools or Yahoo Site Explorer. Either works. They search your blog for any kind of malware and inform you. Keep checking regularly.

3) Don’t clutter your blog. Keep it simple. More widgets you add, more chances of malware. Avoid animations, music, graphics unless you have those specific blogs. It also affects loading and results in lesser number of visitors. I avoid those blogs which are filled with all kinds of gadgetry. It takes away the pleasure of reading, let alone commenting.

4) If you have to have a site counter, go for well known ones. Statcounter or sitemeter work well. I had put good counter which was the culprit for Malware.

Explore the net as how to protect your blog. Blogs are extension of our creativity. Losing it is painful. Ask me. I almost went insane.

deathless ghosts

Do hop on aboard the Monday Poetry Train. Great place to hangout. Post your creative links there. What’s stopping you?

in that deathless night
dark images dance merrily
undead spirits come alive
ghost graves shake
melting into dead air
heat of that night
goes icily cold
I shiver thousand miles away.

“you would have understood me,
had you but waited.”

stolen from the air

I take random lines out of poems
tear and again paste those
into arresting thoughts
a picture forms, assimilating
those torn lines, and some from air too
that broken guitar stands up
and plays by itself tearing into my heart
I again take those torn lines
reform them into wicked poems
rhythmic poetry prevails again

“I clutch my knees and make music in my mind”

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Posted for 3WW, One Single Impression and Sunday Scribblings.

x-y-z: all three axes

Once I started, it wrote itself. I did it without any pause, let alone editing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

angelically moving

like a belly dancer

who convolutes to a tune

she draped herself into him

her ethereal presence

formulated certain

gentle feelings

in that stone heart

inching towards his soul

he jack-knifed

knocking her

lovely form aside

as soon moribund

naked emotions

took over

progressing

quantifying

regressing

into sadness

like a heavy tomb

of umbrella.

a vellum fell from sky

walls demolished

x-axis of their love

intersected at y and z-axis.

“Love has to be three dimensional or may be four”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Posted for Read Write Poem and Totally Optional prompts

Vacation time

I am on my summer vacations, reading, writing and sleeping. We must not forget the eating part either. Delhi is too hot. I needed to get away from it. So I am going to Nainital, a beautiful place, hill station really. It ought to give me a bit of relaxation.

So I will be away from 17th to 21st. Without internet. Ah, bliss! I will not be doing any sight seeing but just about relaxing in a resort. I need that. Actually all of us need that. I will write poetry and take pictures.

Yes, I will take along books. Can I survive without books? My list:

The Crying Tree by Naseem Rakha
The World I never Made by James Lepore
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
Baby Shark by Robert Fate
Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks
Selected Poems of Carl Sandburg

I have scheduled a few posts to come up in the next few days. Don’t forget to visit and leave your foot prints. And please someone link my Thursday post to Read Write Poem and Totally Optional prompts? You can find the those on my left sidebar. I will catch up when I get back on Sunday.

tea with mixed drinks

that steamy cup
contains the world
immediate
as well as
far off places
TWIRLING SMELL OF TEA
carries this image
of togetherness
caring and sharing
which keeps me going
tea is just an excuse

I like to bend the rules of NaiSaiKu!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Broken glass crunches noisily under feet, empty bottle rolls under the bed. Drunk, I fall on bed, you follow me soon, totally unrecognisable. Dark mottled stains of you on my body stinks of a debauchery filled night.

And do you like the Sandwich?

spooky does it..

he arrived dead tired into the farm-
stopped at the stables, tended the horses
his own soothing words made him fall asleep
in his waking dreamy state he saw
a lantern light from deeper in the barn
shone on a man and woman in the door-
step, their raised voices got to him
he rose and walked towards them

he stumbled on a weed and fell on the door
when he got inside the room to see more
like two kids they were lying on the floor
having fistfights over an stupid apple core

filigreed walls

I pulled the blinds
sunlight percolated
into my domain
filigreed walls
swayed delicately

I felt your pull
drawing me into you
your heartbeat
hurtled into mine
in a staccato

ghosts of the past night
ran away so fast
that I couldn’t imagine
they had been there
lying absurdly between us

“now only you, I and
swaying filigreed walls“

dance baby, dance

reflecting resplendently
three tiered gypsy skirt
beckoned to me to yard sale.
a gem amongst the junk
I twirled it in my hands

wrapped it around me
tiny bells tinkled merrily
and I was totally sold
buying it instantly
I retreated jauntily

felt someone pulling at me
begging for the skirt
angrily I turned back
ready refusal on my lips.
no words came out of me

“I gave it away with no second thoughts
at the fag end of her career,
Madonna needed it than I did”

Versified Reviews

Those two verses are review of sorts for Curse of the Pogo Stick by Colin Cotterill.

Read my review of the book here.

thousand-year-old spirit
thrives in his aged body
dangerous keepsake for some
FOR THE RESTLESS CORONER
that dangerous keepsake
rejuvenates his aging body
spirit found abode in 1000 years

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Seventy three-year-old doctor of Laos, restlessly slept through long boring speeches. Dangerous turn, kidnapped on the way back by seven young Hmong females. Twin sons of the Chief’s daughter become his keepsake for sometime to come.