Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa
Where are the games now, the stables, the horses? Where are the drums and the bugles?
Where are the sword-belts and the chariots? Where are the scarlet uniforms?
Where are the rings, and the beautiful faces? They are nowhere to be seen.
The third Babar-vani hymn opens as a walk through the emptied city, asking the oldest question in poetry: where are they now? Scholars call this form ubi sunt, from the Latin — it appears in every literature on earth, because every civilization eventually stands in its own ruins. Guru Nanak's version is an inventory of power's theater: the games, the cavalry, the military band, the parade uniforms. All of it was staging; the stage is struck; the question echoes in the empty square.
Think of something that seemed permanent and is now gone. What did it teach you?
Translation by Dr. Sant Singh Khalsa·How we use AI