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| Mikhail S Gorbachev |
"
The sick sickle and hammer suffered since the sixties,
when the war that wasn't hot was too hot to handle,
there was beauty in struggle, like autumn's lillies,
brought up in the red banner of Moscow's granduer.
A clash of ideologies set after a gory war,
brought no glory to the common man,
swollen pride mattered little with prices they can't bear,
and one man understood the rut, a reformer in a dying clan.
The warriors of west, those champions of democracy mocked 'Trust but verify',
with the ashes of the second world consigned in Afghanistan's battlefields.
But, one little Gorbi made one last stand,
hated by left right and centre, still not corrupted by power.
Glasnost and Perestroika, the comrade general secretary ensured in letter and spirit,
unmindful of history's partisan junior judges, unaware of the betrayals by one and all,
Tried till the last to hold the republics, but never forcing the winds of change,
'This is how it ends, Sasha' said the maligned Gorbi and quietly slipped out with no applause.
"
Mikhail S Gorbachev passed away in August 2022. He was the president of the Sovier Union from 1985 to 1991, whose well meant reforms of Glasnost and Perestroika could not save the Union from disintegration. Although there is divided opinion on his legacy, one should accept his role in the end of cold war and his unappreciated efforts to save the people reeling under an in-efficient socio-enconmic system, his untiring efforts to unite the union till the last, and his stoic refusal to quell rebellions in the republic.
Tuesday, 27th of September, 2022
16 Saladi Jamindar Street,
Palakollu
