Let me rub the sleep that dusts superfluity from my eyes under my thumb-nails dies the sparrow yearning for a brave new Pakistan at last with the final squeaks of the parrot perhaps that day will never be I have not chest and shoulder enough to include all the birthing problems of this bleeding psyche but have heart now to create in this Pakistan a galvanism to stir contagious glory from the tattered cob-webs hung in shreds in the lonely nooks of our minds from the paradigmatic personality of the faded heroes of yesterday perhaps that day will never be for our yesteryears Delacroix paints our todays stand splashed in infant confusion in instant chaos and harbours no promise of genius or even sanity. There must seems be an ancient Sanskrit curse over me but yet awhile that great heart of Omar beats in me and Ali’s hand holds my sword perhaps that day will never be find in my land openness and brotherhood and in that lost Islam a beechen plot to lie in of mottled pages while moths wing out. Standing bow-legged in the dim corridors of myopic history I suck at the lollipops of the past for reprieve find tolerance and tenets of emerald Islam crying its now or never perhaps that day will never be but perhaps it may then I change it sure. The writer is the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, School of International Service, American University, Washington, DC Published in Daily Times, March 26th 2019.