Our Karmas lie Crushed by Max Babi (A Transcreation)

Kargarti kaakludio ne kachadayela karmo

Sajjan Shahmrug and chhakta dharmo

Uparvat dekhaav khilo uthyo ne ‘mushtaq’

khovaaee gaya loochhaaee gaya marmo.

Our karmas lie crushed, as our whines beg on,

the genteel are ostriches, religions belligerent..

‘Mushtaq’ see the blossoming of superficiality

Essence of everything is erased and lost.

Max Babi is an Indian poet who was born in Cambay (Khambhat), a city in central Gujarat. He was born into an ex-royal family of Junagarh and Radhanpur and grew up mainly at Baroda (now Vadodara) under the loving care of missionary Jesuits at Rosary High School. His mother tongue is Urdu, but by age twelve he had mastered English, being completely self-taught. Seven years of NCC-Air Wing, marching, camps and a court marshall could not remove his slouch, nor his Gandhian values. He learnt flying but gave it up, since he found aero-engines more fascinating. He qualified as a metallurgist but slipped into plasma technology, and so has been riding both careers for 37 years now. He has been writing in five languages since his schooldays, and has been heavily published on the internet and in trade magazines. At present he is dabbling in journalism as well as writing fiction and poetry. His particular writing focus is on the transcreation of Urdu and Gujarati poems. A book is half ready, and several of his stories have been accepted by the Chicken Soup for the Indian Soul series. He also writes regularly for Pune Mirror, a part of the Times of India.