VERSION FRANCOPHONE OTHER POEMS
Inspired
by Raghavan Iyer’s
The Moral and Political Thought of Mahatma Gandhi
My love accepts
reproach.
My love answers to
no one but me.
My love bears equally indifference, ridicule, abuse, repression, respect and reverence.
My love bears Truth,
bares Truth.
My love beckons me
into the mortal pitfalls of politics.
My love can err but
never fail.
My love cannot be
cruel.
My love cannot be
gainsaid.
My love cannot
coerce or be coerced.
My love cannot do
harm.
My love cannot lose
or lose me.
My love corrects.
My love craves the
mothers’ milk of pure religion.
My love demands that
I know myself.
My love disgraces me
by my own errors.
My love faces the
consequences.
My love has all
the time in the world.
My love improves.
My love increases
with the observance of Truth.
My love is better
than me.
My love is
consistent.
My love is
infinitely brave.
My love is my
obligation.
My love is my
religion.
My love is neither
public nor private.
My love is
passionately celibate.
My love is
perfectible.
My love is
spontaneous.
My love is stronger
than hate, than my hate.
My love is the still,
small voice.
My love is the
Truth.
My love is the
World.
My love knows
soul-force.
My love loves my
opponents.
My love loves
self-sacrifice and self-suffering.
My love loves the
climb, not the unreachable summit.
My love makes me a
hero.
My love makes me
act, not tarry.
My love makes me
fear my mistakes, nothing else.
My love makes me
humble.
My love makes me
want to help others.
My love makes me
want to suffer.
My love obeys every
good law.
My love sends my
judge, jailer and assassin.
My love tolerates no
cowardice.
My love tolerates no
evil.
My love waxes and
wanes, never stagnates.
My love’s burden is
featherweight.
My love’s fight or
flight becomes “Stay near here and suffer by my side.”
My love’s martyrdom
is bliss.
My love’s only
betrayal is my weakness.
My lovers answer
only to themselves.
My lovers are among
the beaten and the scorned.
My lovers are anyone
and everyone.
My lovers are
blessed by God.
My lovers are born
disciplinarians, instinctive law-abiders.
My lovers are calm
and wise.
My lovers are
Clutchers-after-Truth.
My lovers are
consumed and consummated.
My lovers are
fearless.
My lovers are
gloriously ordinary.
My lovers are God.
My lovers are
harmless, blameless.
My lovers are in the
crowd and in the cave.
My lovers are
kinsmen and strangers, young and old, man and woman, friend and foe alike.
My lovers are me.
My lovers are mine.
My lovers are moral.
My lovers are my
family.
My lovers are my
opponents.
My lovers are my
strength.
My lovers are
neither moralists nor legalists.
My lovers are never
without my love.
My lovers are noble.
My lovers are
non-violent.
My lovers are not
creatures of habit.
My lovers are owed
everything.
My lovers are
passionate, total.
My lovers are perfect
as they are.
My lovers are
Rebels, not Rulers.
My lovers are
revolutionaries.
My lovers are
saintly politicians.
My lovers are
self-freed in the art of action.
My lovers are
self-governing.
My lovers are
selfless.
My lovers are the
Few.
My lovers are the
meanest creatures.
My lovers are the
Other.
My lovers are to die
for.
My lovers are to die
laughing with.
My lovers are too
perfect to Be.
My lovers attract
more lovers.
My lovers believe
that the individual is sacrosanct.
My lovers bring me
delight and peace through utmost turmoil.
My lovers can only
be respected or pitied.
My lovers cannot be
coerced.
My lovers cannot be
harmed except by misunderstanding.
My lovers cannot be
State or Nation.
My lovers cannot
bear a grudge.
My lovers cannot
coerce.
My lovers cannot do
harm.
My lovers cannot go
wrong.
My lovers cannot harm
me.
My lovers cannot
lie.
My lovers carefully consider the consequences.
My lovers comfort
the oppressor and the oppressed alike.
My lovers compel
their enemy’s admiration.
My lovers cooperate
with those who won’t.
My lovers demand
correction.
My lovers demand
my very life.
My lovers demand
purification, penitence, and non-cooperation with evil.
My lovers despise
apathy.
My lovers do no
harm.
My lovers do not
come to me in fear.
My lovers do not
oppress.
My lovers don’t care
about majority rule.
My lovers
don’t worry about consequences.
My lovers emerge
from my opponents through my suffering.
My lovers exemplify
Truth and Non-Violence.
My lovers expect the
highest discipline.
My lovers experiment
playfully.
My lovers express
love through love.
My lovers fight by
enduring injury upon themselves.
My lovers grant
their opponents the same rights they claim.
My lovers hate
indiscipline and chaosism.
My lovers have been
every Prophet.
My lovers have faith
in inherent goodness.
My lovers heal and cure.
My lovers heed the
Inner Voice.
My lovers I cannot
harm.
My lovers I must
imitate.
My lovers in prison,
I must to prison go.
My lovers keep me
company in the Hole.
My lovers know pure
sincerity.
My lovers know right
from wrong.
My lovers know
guilt, not shame.
My lovers leave me
no alternative but love.
My lovers leave me
sleepless at night.
My lovers love
conscience.
My lovers love
justice.
My lovers love me as
themselves.
My lovers love me
like God.
My lovers love my
Vows.
My lovers love
prayer.
My lovers love the
underdog.
My lovers make
fasting a feast.
My lovers make
honor.
My lovers make me a
lunatic.
My lovers make me
fearless.
My lovers make me
like unto nothing.
My lovers make me
powerless without them.
My lovers make me
strong in love.
My lovers make me
weak.
My lovers make no
exceptions.
My lovers make other
interests trivial.
My lovers make
personal gain worthless.
My lovers make up
the only Law.
My lovers may not be
harassed.
My lovers may not be
hurt.
My lovers may not
be quietly watched being hurt.
My lovers may only
be loved.
My lovers merit
total sacrifice.
My lovers must be
pursued, not shunned.
My lovers must be
seduced.
My lovers need bring
me no other advantage.
My lovers never
retaliate.
My lovers obey in
every good thing.
My lovers obey only
their beloved.
My lovers obey their
jailers’ slightest rule in good conscience.
My lovers offer
matchless weapons of Truth.
My lovers overcome
shame with perfectibility.
My lovers practice
detachment in intense concentration.
My lovers practice
self-effort to become self-aware.
My lovers prize absolute
truth over relative truth.
My lovers purify me.
My lovers reserve
the strongest remedies as last resorts.
My lovers seduce the
loveless.
My lovers seek peace
within themselves.
My lovers self-rule.
My lovers shall be
many.
My lovers shield me
as I harm myself alone.
My lovers shield me
from raging crowds.
My lovers shower me
with mercy.
My lovers smash bad
laws.
My lovers take
tremendous risks.
My lovers teach me
everything.
My lovers trust
those who don’t.
My lovers undergo
trials and observe principles.
My lovers voice
their innermost convictions.
My lovers, ever
courteous and thoughtful.
My lovers, failing,
lack imagination.
My lovers, free to
choose, pick selflessness.
My lovers, loveless,
are full of law.
My lovers, loveless,
are powerless.
My lovers, loveless,
feel shame.
My lovers, loveless,
must be seduced.
My lovers’ acts are
those of heroes.
My lovers’ acts may
be judged right or wrong.
My lovers’ attitudes
must be perfected.
My lovers’ capital
is character.
My lovers’ ends are
inevitable.
My lovers’ enemies
cannot be surrendered to.
My lovers’
enlightenment is more important than my happiness.
My lovers’ fellow
feeling is godly.
My lovers’ Good is
better than any Best.
My lovers’ happiness
is more important than my life.
My lovers’ love is
painstaking.
My lovers’ love is
purchased with my suffering.
My lovers’
lovelessness must be changed.
My lovers’ means are
everything—ends, automatic.
My lovers’
separation kills me.
My lovers’ sleeping
conscience reawakens.
My love: birdsong
and heartbreaking sunsets.
My love: Linda.
My love: your art
and mine, together.
My love: the sun,
the moon and the stars!
Everything is due to
my lovers and due them.
I am real person,
Alive in God because
I love,
Not just an animal
baying at an empty world.
Peace management rests on Satyagraha and the fine art of verifaction.
Study them as if our lives depended on them and hung in the balance.
LEARNERS: On the Move from
WeaponWorld to PeaceWorld