Poem: Are you still our comrade?
Posted by enaadoug1982 on September 20, 2011
Dil Sahni, is a renowned writer, professor, and Maoist sympathizer in Nepal. He works as the coordinator of the M.A. English Department at Butwal Multiple Campus, Nepal.
This poem was first published by Winter Has Its End, which is offering a series of poems by revolutionaries in Nepal.
Comrade
by Dil Sahni
Comrade!
When you were in the street
You spoke revolution
Comrade!
When you were in the slums
You spoke liberation
Comrade!
When you were with the people
Like the fish in the water
You spoke Marxism
You spoke Leninism
You spoke Maoism
You spoke so much
Socialism and Communism
And what not
But now Comrade!
When you are in the chair
You do not hear
What the street would say to you
But now Comrade
When you are in your heavenly kingdom
You do not visit the slums
Even just to confirm
Whether they are happily dead
Or still alive
But now Comrade!
When you are in the palace
You do not face the people
even just to ascertain
What complaints they would make
Frankly speaking
If you don’t mind
What you were in the past Comrade
You are not in the present
You are wonderfully changed
When nothing is changed
with your kind permission
May I ask you the crux of the question
O Comrade!
Are you still a Comrade
Or everything
Except a Comrade.
Revolution in South Asia 
Maju said
Beautiful. I presume this is directed to the liquidationist sector, right?
Roshan said
this poem was first published in march 2009 on dissident voice by myself. it is great that this is being republished, but in a sense, it is old news.
http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/03/question-for-a-leading-comrade/
Harry Sims said
Thanks Roshan. We felt it was appropriate now to republish this as a part of a series examining the revolution in Nepal, including various analysis from other forces.
eric ribellarsi said
We weren’t aware that it was published elsewhere. We had the honor of having Dil Sahni as our translator during the Maoist cultural program the Liam Wright wrote about:
http://winterends.net/nepal-stories/123-a-maoist-performance-bring-the-storm
He gave us several books of his poetry. Very thoughtful, soft-spoken, and a serious revolutionary.