Great Poets Come Alive to Aid Needy Kids

"Every child comes with a message that God is not still discouraged of man."
Rabindranath Tagore, Nobel Laureate, India

It is no wonder then that all kind souls reach out to aid the needy child, each in their own ways. It was sheer serendipity that I chanced upon a book - 'A Poem for CRY - Favorite poems of Famous Indians. A joint venture of Penguin Books and CRY (Child Rights and You), this anthology of poems is unique. The proceeds of the sale of this handsome volume will go to aid the needy children. Letters were written to hundred national icons of India, to send in their favorite poem along with a few lines, why that poem was so special to them. Right from the President of India to Prime Minister, to screen idol Shah Rukh Khan to cricketing star, Sachin Tendulkar. Artists, poets, intellectuals, social activists, top industrialists, editors , lawyers all showed alacrity in taking time out for their favorite poem and most of all for the needy kids.

Love of poetry is not so apparent these days. So it was very heartening that public figures, who hardly have time to breath, did have a poem in their heart. The choices are also revealing:

The most favorite poet was Rabindranath Tagore, India's Poet Laureate as well as a Nobel Laureate. He inspired eighteen people from all walks of life. His most quoted poem was 'Where the mind is without fear:

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
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.

Our Founding Fathers very much heeded the Vedic vision behind the poet's call, while framing our Constitution, where one can breathe freedom from every direction.

Bollywood idol Shah Rukh Khan offered Abe Lincoln's 'Letter to Principal of his son's school'. "This is my favorite poem because my father gave it to me to read when I was fourteen. It believes in competition and compassion, traits I have grown to believe are the essence of good life", he wrote.

'Daffodils' by William Wordsworth was the favorite of three Indians, Writer Mulk Raj Anand, Chess master Viswanath Anand, film director Karan Johar, who said that ' It conveys man's sense of joy in nature'. This is also one of my own favorites, and ever since I learnt it at school, I often drift along with the poet, just as "I wandered lonely as cloud, that floats on high o'er vales and hills........"

Robert Frost thrilled a high profile CEO, a leading industrialist, a banker and a founder of a leading Technology company, with his 'The road not taken', the last four lines being:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

Many pace setters in our country, when asked about how they took such off beat decisions have said ,that this poem had given them the courage, to go the unconventional way.

A leading cookery book author has very aptly chosen, 'Children's eyes.' By Tom Krause:

What kind of world is it that little children see?
......................
If this is what the children see
Then it should be no surprise
That the world should be a better place
If we all had children's eyes.

The sway of poetry was well recognized by Shelly when he said that "Poets are the unrecognized legislators of the world". The roles of our poets and rousing patriotic songs made even the dormant soul to answer the call of 'arise, awake and sleep not, till your goal is reached' and to put shoulders together for the fight for India's freedom.

That the great poets of the past have been brought alive, along with the leading national icons of India, to reach out to the needy child is a great tribute to all those from the past and the present, in making this unusual book possible.