Sanjeev Bhatt

May I salute you, officer Bhatt,
For feckless citizen that I am,
However well-meaning,
Your Promethean metal
Fires my feebleness to a blaze;
You are to our home-grown tyrants
As Bhagat Singh was to the Angrez.

Like the Amazon, Setalvad,
On the worst of day
You teach the lesson that
The poet of old taught—
When the sensible-terrified
Slink from your side,
Then ‘ekla chalo re.’

As to success, success is not
Merely the end of things;
Success is in the soul that
Man, woman, or child brings
To what is with mortal dangers fraught.

The success you already have
Is not for a season or two;
It is a flavour that generations
Will savour,
A rod of steel that the fallen
Spine will raise, giving to cruelty
And cunning their due.

*
Badri Raina