The Ramayana Part 60

Where sleeps my strong-armed hero, where, Like Lord Mahendra's standard, fair?

Where is, by Lakshma?'s side, his bed, His club-like arm beneath his head?

When shall I see his flower-like eyes, And face that with the lotus vies, Feel his sweet lily breath, and view His glorious hair and lotus hue?

The heart within my breast, I feel, Is adamant or hardest steel, Or, in a thousand fragments split, The loss of him had shattered it, When those I love, who should be blest, Are wandering in the wood distressed, Condemned their wretched lives to lead In exile, by thy ruthless deed.

If, when the fourteen years are past, Rama reseeks his home at last, I think not Bharat will consent To yield the wealth and government.

At funeral feasts some mourners deal To kith and kin the solemn meal, And having duly fed them all Some Brahmans to the banquet call.

The best of Brahmans, good and wise, The tardy summoning despise, And, equal to the G.o.ds, disdain Cups, e'en of Amrit, thus to drain.

Nay e'en when Brahmans first have fed, They loathe the meal for others spread, And from the leavings turn with scorn, As bulls avoid a fractured horn.

So Rama, sovereign lord of men, Will spurn the sullied kingship then: He born the eldest and the best, His younger's leavings will detest, Turning from tasted food away, As tigers scorn another's prey.

The sacred post is used not twice, Nor elements, in sacrifice.

But once the sacred gra.s.s is spread, But once with oil the flame is fed: So Rama's pride will ne'er receive The royal power which others leave, Like wine when tasteless dregs are left, Or rites of Soma juice bereft.

Be sure the pride of Raghu's race Will never stoop to such disgrace: The lordly lion will not bear That man should beard him in his lair.

Were all the worlds against him ranged His dauntless soul were still unchanged: He, dutiful, in duty strong, Would purge the impious world from wrong.

Could not the hero, brave and bold, The archer, with his shafts of gold, Burn up the very seas, as doom Will in the end all life consume?

Of lion's might, eyed like a bull, A prince so brave and beautiful, Thou hast with wicked hate pursued, Like sea-born tribes who eat their brood.

If thou, O Monarch, hadst but known The duty all the Twice-born own, If the good laws had touched thy mind, Which sages in the Scriptures find, Thou ne'er hadst driven forth to pine This brave, this duteous son of thine.

First on her lord the wife depends, Next on her son and last on friends: These three supports in life has she, And not a fourth for her may be.

Thy heart, O King, I have not won; In wild woods roams my banished son; Far are my friends: ah, hapless me, Quite ruined and destroyed by thee."

Canto LXII. Dasaratha Consoled.

The queen's stern speech the monarch heard, As rage and grief her bosom stirred, And by his anguish sore oppressed Reflected in his secret breast.

Fainting and sad, with woe distraught, He wandered in a maze of thought; At length the queller of the foe Grew conscious, rallying from his woe.

When consciousness returned anew Long burning sighs the monarch drew, Again immersed in thought he eyed Kausalya standing by his side.

Back to his pondering soul was brought The direful deed his hand had wrought, When, guiltless of the wrong intent, His arrow at a sound was sent.

Distracted by his memory's sting, And mourning for his son, the king To two consuming griefs a prey, A miserable victim lay.

The double woe devoured him fast, As on the ground his eyes he cast, Joined suppliant hands, her heart to touch, And spake in the answer, trembling much: "Kausalya, for thy grace I sue, Joining these hands as suppliants do.

Thou e'en to foes hast ever been A gentle, good, and loving queen.

Her lord, with n.o.ble virtues graced, Her lord, by lack of all debased, Is still a G.o.d in woman's eyes, If duty's law she hold and prize.

Thou, who the right hast aye pursued, Life's changes and its chances viewed, Shouldst never launch, though sorrow-stirred, At me distressed, one bitter word."

She listened, as with sorrow faint He murmured forth his sad complaint: Her br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes with tears ran o'er, As spouts the new fallen water pour; His suppliant hands, with fear dismayed She gently clasped in hers, and laid, Like a fair lotus, on her head, And faltering in her trouble said: "Forgive me; at thy feet I lie, With low bent head to thee I cry.

By thee besought, thy guilty dame Pardon from thee can scarcely claim.

She merits not the name of wife Who cherishes perpetual strife With her own husband good and wise, Her lord both here and in the skies.

I know the claims of duty well, I know thy lips the truth must tell.

All the wild words I rashly spoke, Forth from my heart, through anguish, broke; For sorrow bends the stoutest soul, And cancels Scripture's high control.

Yea, sorrow's might all else o'erthrows The strongest and the worst of foes.

'Tis thus with all: we keenly feel, Yet bear the blows our foemen deal, But when a slender woe a.s.sails The manliest spirit bends and quails.

The fifth long night has now begun Since the wild woods have lodged my son: To me whose joy is drowned in tears, Each day a dreary year appears.

While all my thoughts on him are set Grief at my heart swells wilder yet: With doubled might thus Ocean raves When rushing floods increase his waves."

As from Kausalya reasoning well The gentle words of wisdom fell, The sun went down with dying flame, And darkness o'er the landscape came.

His lady's soothing words in part Relieved the monarch's aching heart, Who, wearied out by all his woes, Yielded to sleep and took repose.

Canto LXIII. The Hermit's Son.

But soon by rankling grief oppressed The king awoke from troubled rest, And his sad heart was tried again With anxious thought where all was pain.

Rama and Lakshma?'s mournful fate On Dasaratha, good and great As Indra, pressed with crushing weight, As when the demon's might a.s.sails The Sun-G.o.d, and his glory pales.

Ere yet the sixth long night was spent, Since Rama to the woods was sent, The king at midnight sadly thought Of the old crime his hand had wrought, And thus to Queen Kausalya cried Who still for Rama moaned and sighed: "If thou art waking, give, I pray, Attention to the words I say.

Whate'er the conduct men pursue, Be good or ill the acts they do, Be sure, dear Queen, they find the meed Of wicked or of virtuous deed.

A heedless child we call the man Whose feeble judgment fails to scan The weight of what his hands may do, Its lightness, fault, and merit too.

One lays the Mango garden low, And bids the gay Palasas grow: Longing for fruit their bloom he sees, But grieves when fruit should bend the trees.

Cut by my hand, my fruit-trees fell, Palasa trees I watered well.

My hopes this foolish heart deceive, And for my banished son I grieve.

Kausalya, in my youthful prime Armed with my bow I wrought the crime, Proud of my skill, my name renowned, An archer prince who shoots by sound.

The deed this hand unwitting wrought This misery on my soul has brought, As children seize the deadly cup And blindly drink the poison up.

As the unreasoning man may be Charmed with the gay Palasa tree, I unaware have reaped the fruit Of joying at a sound to shoot.

As regent prince I shared the throne, Thou wast a maid to me unknown, The early Rain-time duly came, And strengthened love's delicious flame.

The sun had drained the earth that lay All glowing 'neath the summer day, And to the gloomy clime had fled Where dwell the spirits of the dead.(335) The fervent heat that moment ceased, The darkening clouds each hour increased And frogs and deer and peac.o.c.ks all Rejoiced to see the torrents fall.

Their bright wings heavy from the shower, The birds, new-bathed, had scarce the power To reach the branches of the trees Whose high tops swayed beneath the breeze.

The fallen rain, and falling still, Hung like a sheet on every hill, Till, with glad deer, each flooded steep Showed glorious as the mighty deep.

The torrents down its wooded side Poured, some unstained, while others dyed Gold, ashy, silver, ochre, bore The tints of every mountain ore.

In that sweet time, when all are pleased, My arrows and my bow I seized; Keen for the chase, in field or grove, Down Sarju's bank my car I drove.

I longed with all my lawless will Some elephant by night to kill, Some buffalo that came to drink, Or tiger, at the river's brink.

When all around was dark and still, I heard a pitcher slowly fill, And thought, obscured in deepest shade, An elephant the sound had made.

I drew a shaft that glittered bright, Fell as a serpent's venomed bite; I longed to lay the monster dead, And to the mark my arrow sped.

Then in the calm of morning, clear A hermit's wailing smote my ear: "Ah me, ah me," he cried, and sank, Pierced by my arrow, on the bank.

E'en as the weapon smote his side, I heard a human voice that cried: "Why lights this shaft on one like me, A poor and harmless devotee?

I came by night to fill my jar From this lone stream where no men are.

Ah, who this deadly shaft has shot?

Whom have I wronged, and knew it not?

Why should a boy so harmless feel The vengeance of the winged steel?

Or who should slay the guiltless son Of hermit sire who injures none, Who dwells retired in woods, and there Supports his life on woodland fare?

Ah me, ah me, why am I slain, What booty will the murderer gain?

In hermit coils I bind my hair, Coats made of skin and bark I wear.

Ah, who the cruel deed can praise Whose idle toil no fruit repays, As impious as the wretch's crime Who dares his master's bed to climb?

Nor does my parting spirit grieve But for the life which thus I leave: Alas, my mother and my sire,- I mourn for them when I expire.

Ah me, that aged, helpless pair, Long cherished by my watchful care, How will it be with them this day When to the Five(336) I pa.s.s away?

Pierced by the self-same dart we die, Mine aged mother, sire, and I.

Whose mighty hand, whose lawless mind Has all the three to death consigned?"

When I, by love of duty stirred, That touching lamentation heard, Pierced to the heart by sudden woe, I threw to earth my shafts and bow.

My heart was full of grief and dread As swiftly to the place I sped, Where, by my arrow wounded sore, A hermit lay on Sarju's sh.o.r.e.

His matted hair was all unbound, His pitcher empty on the ground, And by the fatal arrow pained, He lay with dust and gore distained.

I stood confounded and amazed: His dying eyes to mine he raised, And spoke this speech in accents stern, As though his light my soul would burn: "How have I wronged thee, King, that I Struck by thy mortal arrow die?

The wood my home, this jar I brought, And water for my parents sought.

This one keen shaft that strikes me through Slays sire and aged mother too.

Feeble and blind, in helpless pain, They wait for me and thirst in vain.

They with parched lips their pangs must bear, And hope will end in blank despair.

Ah me, there seems no fruit in store For holy zeal or Scripture lore, Or else ere now my sire would know That his dear son is lying low.

Yet, if my mournful fate he knew, What could his arm so feeble do?

The tree, firm-rooted, ne'er may be The guardian of a stricken tree.