'Hidu-stan!'
'Paki-stan!'
Voices shouting slogans rent the air like the sounds of Partition once did.
But the air is light and the faces smile amidst the melodrama of the soldier's dance.
Like a military pantomime, they overact their roles-frowning, pouting, strutting, shouting.
Legs kicked to painful heights
Shoulders back
Heads a-cocking, to flare the plumes.
And deep amidst the maddening crowds
the green men wander.
Raising chants and fists when silence threatens to reveal any sign of inferiority.
On the side of the smaller Pakistan, the passion runs higher,
as if they could outshout their obvious geographical disadvantage.
....and I remember tartan faces in sweating pubs, convinced they were meeting King Edwards army once more on the football pitch.
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