Go to the people
Live among them
Learn from them
Love them
Start with what they have
Build on what they have
But of the best leaders
When their task is accomplished
Their work is done
The people all remark
We have done it ourselves !
- Lao Tze
Aug 11, 2009
Jul 29, 2009
Prayer
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
It is most quoted peom of Rabindranath Tagore. This poem is from Gitanjali, lit. Offering of Songs, published in English in 1910.The last two lines of original Bengali version are harsher. They state:
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
It is most quoted peom of Rabindranath Tagore. This poem is from Gitanjali, lit. Offering of Songs, published in English in 1910.The last two lines of original Bengali version are harsher. They state:
"Lord Father, strike {the sleeping} Bharat (India) without mercy,
so that it may awaken into such a heaven."
so that it may awaken into such a heaven."
Jun 28, 2009
For Iran
If the flames of anger rise any higher in this land
Your name on your tombstone will be covered with dirt.
You have become a babbling loudmouth.
Your insolent ranting, something to joke about.
The lies you have found, you have woven together.
The rope you have crafted, you will find around your neck.
Pride has swollen your head, your faith has grown blind.
The elephant that falls will not rise.
Stop this extravagance, this reckless throwing of my country to the wind.
The grim-faced rising cloud, will grovel at the swamp's feet.
Stop this screaming, mayhem, and blood shed.
Stop doing what makes God's creatures mourn with tears.
My curses will not be upon you, as in their fulfillment.
My enemies' afflictions also cause me pain.
You may wish to have me burned , or decide to stone me.
But in your hand match or stone will lose their power to harm me.
Simin Behbahani, Iran's national poet.
June 2009 Translated by Kaveh Safa and Farzaneh Milani
In this poem, she speaks out against the crackdown of Iranian government on their own people.
Your name on your tombstone will be covered with dirt.
You have become a babbling loudmouth.
Your insolent ranting, something to joke about.
The lies you have found, you have woven together.
The rope you have crafted, you will find around your neck.
Pride has swollen your head, your faith has grown blind.
The elephant that falls will not rise.
Stop this extravagance, this reckless throwing of my country to the wind.
The grim-faced rising cloud, will grovel at the swamp's feet.
Stop this screaming, mayhem, and blood shed.
Stop doing what makes God's creatures mourn with tears.
My curses will not be upon you, as in their fulfillment.
My enemies' afflictions also cause me pain.
You may wish to have me burned , or decide to stone me.
But in your hand match or stone will lose their power to harm me.
Simin Behbahani, Iran's national poet.
June 2009 Translated by Kaveh Safa and Farzaneh Milani
In this poem, she speaks out against the crackdown of Iranian government on their own people.
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