The morning after the Supreme Court refused to review its decision to ban homosexuality, poet Vikram Seth expressed his disappointment in a poem titled 'Through Love's Great Power'.
The poem was mailed to editors at NDTV, hoping that it "would give heart to some". The writer has been among the most prominent critics of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which makes homosexuality illegal.
Here is the full text of the poem.
Through Love's Great Power
Through love's great power to be made whole
In mind and body, heart and soul –
Through freedom to find joy, or be
By dint of joy itself set free
In love and in companionhood:
This is the true and natural good.
To undo justice, and to seek
To quash the rights that guard the weak -
To sneer at love, and wrench apart
The bonds of body, mind and heart
With specious reason and no rhyme:
This is the true unnatural crime.
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The poem was mailed to editors at NDTV, hoping that it "would give heart to some". The writer has been among the most prominent critics of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which makes homosexuality illegal.
Here is the full text of the poem.
Through Love's Great Power
Through love's great power to be made whole
In mind and body, heart and soul –
Through freedom to find joy, or be
By dint of joy itself set free
In love and in companionhood:
This is the true and natural good.
To undo justice, and to seek
To quash the rights that guard the weak -
To sneer at love, and wrench apart
The bonds of body, mind and heart
With specious reason and no rhyme:
This is the true unnatural crime.