No,
dear Otto René Castillo,[1]
the apolitical intellectuals of our time,
won’t be mute in their shame
if they’re asked by those undead
what they did when the people of their country
were dying tragically before their time
by the hands of the tyrant’s men.
At that time,
some apolitical academics
were counting their citations in Google Scholar,
some others
were revising their half-plagiarized manuscripts,
and the rest
were obsessed with a new pay scale.
Some apolitical poets,
oh, dear Castillo,
those pets of the dictator,
were writing pretentious poems of peace,
some others were suspiciously silent,
and a few were advocating for atrocities
perpetrated on the people.
The apolitical writers became unashamedly political
to support the repressive regime,
and the journalists were licking
the boots of those in power.
No, dear Castillo,
the apolitical intellectuals of our time
won’t be mute in their shame
for what they did;
rather, they’ll boast of being the accomplices
and of their contriving complexion,
if they’re asked what they did
when their countrymen were dying.
Rakibul Hasan Khan is a Bangladeshi academic, poet, and writer based in New Zealand, where he is at the moment a visiting scholar in English at the University of Otago. He can be reached at [email protected].
[1] Otto René Castillo (1934–1967) was a Guatemalan poet and revolutionary. This poem is inspired by Castillo’s poem “Apolitical Intellectuals.”
