Avtar Singh Sandhu ‘Pash’
If not Frontier, read TribuneIf not Calcutta, talk about DaccaBring the clippings fromOrganiser and Punjab KesariAnd tell meWhere are these eagles flying?Who has died?Time is not any dogThat can be chained and driven wherever you likeYou tell usMao says this and Mao says thatI ask you, who is Mao to say anything?Words cannot be pawned awayTime itself can speakMoments are not speechless.You sit in the RambleOr drink a cup of tea from a side stallSpeak truth or lie –It doesn’t matter,You may even jump over the corpse of silence——-And O rulers, askYour police and tell meWhether I am imprisoned behind the barsOr this policeman standing across?Truth is not a whore of AIRTime is not any dog.
Translated from Punjabi by Pratyush Chandra
Note: (1) Frontier, Tribune, Organiser and Punjab Kesari are names of weeklies and newspapers published in India. (2) AIR stands for All India Radio.
Avtar Singh Sandhu ‘Pash’ (1950-1988) was a celebrated revolutionary poet from Punjab (India). The above poem is taken from his collection Loh-katha (Iron-tale).
Radical Notes 
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