Sunday, June 8, 2014

The Most Dangerous Thing by (Pash) Avtar Singh Sandhu

                                                                 Avtar Singh Sandhu  
The life of a pirate is not so dangerous

nor is a bashup in a police lockup

spying too is not very dangerous

to be woken up in the middle of the night

by the secret police

I admit is nerve wrecking

so is the quiet lonely fear

which follows you

and throttles your chest

when you are locked up in a cell

on a framed up false charge

for a crime you did not commit

all this I admit is bad enough

but all these are still not so dangerous

because the most dangerous thing is

to live like a dead man

when you don’t feel any thing

when the routine of daily life saps you totally

the fixed life of

home to work

work to home

that is a life without dreams

that is the most dangerous thing

that is when

the hour is alive and kicking for everyone

excepting for you

that life is the most dangerous thing

because

like the eyes of a dead fish

you stare at everything

but cannot feel anything

about yourself

or about others

that’s why

the most dangerous are those people

who have forgotten how to love people

for such people

live and shift aimlessly

in the ordinary humdrum orbit of their lives

in which nothing happens

nothing moves

like a placid cemetery

these people

are like that cold blooded moon

which feels nothing

no pain, love, sympathy or revulsion

when it goes over the courtyards

of the innocent victims

butchered in a slaughter

the most ugly sight is

that of a debauched old man

who is trying to sing a melody

but only succeeds in racking his weak chest

So the most dangerous life is the one

in which our conscience doesn’t prick you

because your soul is dead

that’s why I say

piracy is not so dangerous

spying is not so dangerous

bashup in a police lockup is not so dangerous

the most dangerous life is…

Translated by Suresh Sethi

Democracy and Class Struggle  publish this poem today has people remember in Hyde Park London, Operation Bluestar and the horrific communal violence of India's Comprador Hindu State against Sikhs by a victim of Khalistani violence Avtar Singh Sandu.

For Punjabi aspirations to be met, mistakes of the past also have to be recognised and unity built of all progressive forces in the Punjab and Pash's murder reminds us of that essential need for unity against the Hindu Corporate State that needs to be built for social and national liberation.

We  agree with the words of the Indian Workers Association about the situation in the Punjab 

"They must unite with the progressive forces in the country that stand for equality of all religions and nationalities of India.

Only this combined strength can act as an effective force against the oppressive and repressive policies of the Indian government.

Only then can the democratic demands of the people of Punjab and other states in India be achieved"

Maybe we should add the most dangerous thing apart from the lack of the dream of freedom is disunity of the oppressed so meticulously fostered by the Indian Corporate Hindu State and Neo Liberalism around the world..




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