This is Why We Remember Him

His name was Rab. He died in Bengal, the land of tigers, in 1941. On his way out the door, he said, “Faith is the bird that feels the light when the dawn is still dark.”When Rab was sixteen, he published a book of poetry under the pseudonym Bhānusiṃha, which means “Sun Lion.” Those poems were seized upon by literary authorities as “long-lost classics.”Where do you hurry with your basketthis late evening when the marketing is over?They all have come home with their burdens;The moon peeps from above the village trees.The echoes of the voices calling for the ferryrun across the dark water to the distant swampwhere wild ducks sleep.Where do you hurry with your basketwhen the marketing is over?Sleep has laid her fingersupon the eyes of the earth.The nests of the crows have become silent,and the murmurs of the bamboo leaves are silent.The labourers home from their fieldsspread their mats in the courtyards.Where do you hurry with your basketwhen the marketing is over?Rab wrote this in 1913,Free me from the bonds of your sweetness, my love!No more of this wine of kisses.This mist of heavy incense stifles my heart.Open the doors, make room for the morning light.I am lost in you, wrapped in the folds of your caresses.Free me from your spells, and give me back the manhoodto offer you my freed heart.Famous for his role as President Jed Bartlet, Martin Sheen spoke several months ago at a White House event celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the debut of “The West Wing” on television. He wrapped up his short speech by reciting a poem that Rab had written more than 100 years earlier.Where the mind is without fear and the head is held highWhere knowledge is freeWhere the world has not been broken up into fragmentsBy narrow domestic wallsWhere words come out from the depth of truthWhere tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfectionWhere the clear stream of reason has not lost its wayInto the dreary desert sand of dead habitWhere the mind is led forward by theeInto ever-widening thought and actionInto that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.Rab knew that you and I would be here today, and he left us a message.Who are you, reader,reading my poems a hundred years hence?I cannot send you one single flowerfrom this wealth of the spring,one single streak of gold from yonder clouds.Open your doors and look abroad.From your blossoming gardengather fragrant memories of the vanished flowersof a hundred years before.In the joy of your heart may you feelthe living joy that sang one spring morning,sending its glad voice across a hundred years.Rab – Rabindranath Tagore – was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913.He was the first non-European ever to win a Nobel Prize.Roy H. WilliamsNOTE FROM INDY: Speaking of Martin Sheen, his name has recently been mentioned in association with the book, “When Rabbis Bless Congress: The Great American Story of Jewish Prayers on Capitol Hill.” Aroo.A timber-framed cottage was built in Frog Holt, England, in the year 1450. Today, 575 years later, that cottage provides an important case study for business owners who are scaling their businesses upward. Douglas Squirrel is a technology leader and business scale-up expert. According to Squirrel, if the army of artisans and technicians who worked on his 575-year-old cottage hadn’t come together in a spirit of cooperation, the roof would have fallen in. And the same is true of every business that is transitioning from the past to the future. It’s a fascinating episode at MondayMorningRadio.com.