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 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.
My love song to the Universe is Our Father
recited alone.
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 it and hung in the balance.
Learner, begin