Go back a thousand years or so,
And you will find a golden bird;
She chirps aloft the Himalayas,
And spreads her wing so wide
That a nation forms from head
To foot, and from side to side,
Drawn with streaks of molten gold
And rivers of golden tide.
There the radiant Brahmin rehearses
His uncanny yogic stroke,
Connecting by Vedic mantra
The earth with swarg-lok.
Alas, but nothing he could do
Held back the marauders;
They rampaged down each golden
Town, and filled their foreign coffers.
The golden bird was wise to the time,
And took off where things were better;
Thus all the gold left Bharat desh,
And settled among the latter.
But, yada yada dharmasya,
Comes forth a new avatar;
And the golden bird will sure return—
The day is not too far.
The bugle sounded from Garden
Square reverberates like thunder;
Penurious Indians, spread your sheets
For the golden rain, and wonder
That six decades were sacrificed
In laborious, rational thrall.
When all one needed was to find
Magic at mere tea stall.