I vividly remember reading this poem for the first time in my 8th standard. Ever since then I felt deeply connected, in some mysterious way, to this beautiful piece of creation from Gitanjali, a masterpiece written by Rabindranath Tagore.
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.
~Rabindranath Tagore
P.S: My “Where” series poems are inspired from this poem!