To speak of despondency, and hope, through poetry

With the asphyxiating claw of pollution again at our throats, and the political discourse touching new depths of incivility, I feel intellectually and emotionally drained.

- Pavan K Varma

But then, my hopes revive when I think of the profundity of our thought leaders and I seek solace in poetry.

Poetry is compressed thought, with the ability, in its sheer brevity and imagery, to jolt the mind out of surrounding mediocrity. Let me begin by two couplets by Gopal Das Neeraj: Ab toh mazhab koi aisa bhi chalaya jaye, jisme insaan ko insaan banaya jaye; jis khushboo se mehak jai padosi ka bhi ghar, phool iss kism ka har simt khilaya jaye (Now, let's make a religion, in which people are treated like human beings; plant such flowers everywhere that their fragrance enters even a neighbour's dwelling). In just two lines, Neeraj demolishes all the simulated divisiveness that politics tries to provoke.