home and heart

my favourite poem since as long as i can remember, these simple lines by tagore never fail to move and inspire me. i recall reciting it for those closest to my heart. and it remains, for me, a prayer for myself and my country.

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