A Door to one's Inner Space

She was a young girl of seven years.  "Draw the picture of a rich house," I asked when we became good friends. She was a good artist.  She had shown me her album of paintings that contained so many wonderful works.  "Rich house?"  she was surprised.  But she started drawing in the next page of her album.

"Here is the rich house," came she after a while bringing a full page painting on that page.  There was a small thatched house on the centre surrounded by plants and flowers.  There were many trees all around.  There was a pond with lotus and ducks.  And a clean  mud road  passed over a bridge crossing a rivulet from the pond.  Far behind stood several layers of golden hills and the red Sun was rising behind all giving golden red light to the entire scene.

"Is this the rich house?" I asked surprisingly.  My tone communicated my expectation of a large concrete modern house with all possible facilities with a few cars on the porch.  "Yes," she said with confidence.  "This house is rich with clean air and good water."  She started explaining.  "It has many trees and birds around.  There are many animals around this house."  I had not seen those details.  "There are rivers, ponds, hills, play grounds for children...."  she was going on explaining.  Yes it was the rich house.  She established.

And a poor house?  I dared not to ask her.