{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/rama/ry250.htm","path":"hin/rama/ry250.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rama/ry250.htm","text":"Fair as the lord of silvery rays\n Whom every star in heaven obeys,\n The Maithil dame her plaint renewed\n O'er him by R\u00e1van's might subdued:\n 'Dreams, omens, auguries foreshow\n Our coming lot of weal and woe:\n But thou, my R\u00e1ma, couldst not see\n The grievous blow which falls on thee.\n The birds and deer desert the brakes\n And show the path my captor takes,\n And thus e'en now this royal bird\n Flew to mine aid by pity stirred.\n Slain for my sake in death he lies,\n The broad-winged rover of the skies.\n O R\u00e1ma, haste, thine aid I crave:\n O Lakshman, why delay to save?\n Brave sons of old Ikshv\u00e1ku, hear\n And rescue in this hour of fear.'\n \u00a0\u00a0 Her flowery wreath was torn and rent,\n Crushed was each sparkling ornament.\n She with weak arms and trembling knees\n Clung like a creeper to the trees,\n And like some poor deserted thing\n With wild shrieks made the forest ring.\n But swift the giant reached her side,\n p. 291\n \n \n As loud on R\u00e1ma's name she cried.\n Fierce as grim Death one hand he laid\n Upon her tresses' lovely braid.\n That touch, thou impious King, shall be\n The ruin of thy race and thee.\n The universal world in awe\n That outrage on the lady saw.\n All nature shook convulsed with dread,\n And darkness o'er the land was spread.\n The Lord of Day grew dark and chill,\n And every breath of air was still.\n The Eternal Father of the sky\n Beheld the crime with heavenly eye.\n And spake with solemn voice, 'The deed,\n The deed is done, of old decreed.'\n Sad were the saints within the grove,\n But triumph with their sorrow strove.\n They wept to see the Maithil dame\n Endure the outrage, scorn, and shame:\n They joyed because his life should pay\n The penalty incurred that day.\n Then R\u00e1van raised her up, and bare\n His captive through the fields of air,\n Calling with accents loud and shrill\n On R\u00e1ma and on Lakshman still.\n With sparkling gems on arm and breast,\n In silk of paly amber dressed,\n High in the air the Maithil dame\n Gleamed like the lightning's flashing flame.\n The giant, as the breezes blew\n Upon her robes of amber hue,\n And round him twined that gay attire,\n Showed like a mountain girt with fire.\n The lady, fairest of the fair,\n Had wreathed a garland round her hair;\n Its lotus petals bright and sweet\n Rained down about the giant's feet.\n Her vesture, bright as burning gold,\n Gave to the wind each glittering fold,\n Fair as a gilded cloud that gleams\n Touched by the Day-God's tempered beams.\n Yet struggling in the fiend's embrace,\n The lady with her sweet pure face,\n Far from her lord, no longer wore\n The light of joy that shone before.\n Like some sad lily by the side\n Of waters which the sun has dried;\n Like the pale moon uprising through\n An autumn cloud of darkest hue,\n So was her perfect face between\n The arms of giant R\u00e1van seen:\n Fair with the charm of braided tress\n And forehead's finished loveliness;\n Fair with the ivory teeth that shed\n White lustre through the lips' fine red,\n Fair as the lotus when the bud\n Is rising from the parent flood.\n With faultless lip and nose and eye.\n Dear as the moon that floods the sky\n With gentle light, of perfect mould,\n She seemed a thing of burnished gold,\n \n \n Though on her cheek the traces lay\n Of tears her hand had brushed away,\n But as the moon-beams swiftly fade\n Ere the great Day-God shines displayed,\n So in that form of perfect grace\n Still trembling in the fiend's embrace,\n From her beloved R\u00e1ma reft,\n No light of pride or joy was left.\n The lady with her golden hue\n O'er the swart fiend a lustre threw,\n As when embroidered girths enfold\n An elephant with gleams of gold.\n Fair as the lily's bending stem\n Her arms adorned with many a gem,\n A lustre to the fiend she lent\n Gleaming from every ornament,\n As when the cloud-shot flashes light\n The shadows of a mountain height.\n Whene'er the breezes earthward bore\n The tinkling of the zone she wore,\n He seemed a cloud of darkness hue\n Sending forth murmurs as it flew.\n As on her way the dame was sped\n From her sweet neck fair flowers were shed,\n The swift wind caught the flowery rain\n And poured it o'er the fiend again.\n The wind-stirred blossoms, sweet to smell,\n On the dark brows of R\u00e1van fell,\n Like lunar constellations set\n On Meru for a coronet.\n From her small foot an anklet fair\n With jewels slipped, and through the air,\n Like a bright circlet of the flame\n Of thunder, to the valley came.\n The Maithil lady, fair to see\n As the young leaflet of a tree\n Clad in the tender hues of spring,\n Flashed glory on the giant king,\n As when a gold-embroidered zone\n Around an elephant is thrown.\n While, bearing far the lady, through\n The realms of sky the giant flew,\n She like a gleaming meteor cast\n A glory round her as she passed.\n Then from each limb in swift descent\n Dropped many a sparkling ornament:\n On earth they rested dim and pale\n Like fallen stars when virtues fail.\u00a01\n Around her neck a garland lay\n Bright as the Star-God's silvery ray:\n It fell and flashed like Gang\u00e1 sent\n From heaven above the firmament.\u00a02\n The birds of every wing had flocked\n To stately trees by breezes rocked:\n \n \n These bowed their wind-swept heads and\n said:\n 'My lady sweet, be comforted.'\n With faded blooms each brook within\n Whose waters moved no gleamy fin,\n Stole sadly through the forest dell\n Mourning the dame it loved so well.\n From every woodland region near\n Came lions, tigers, birds, and deer,\n And followed, each with furious look,\n The way her flying shadow took.\n For S\u00edt\u00e1's loss each lofty hill\n Whose tears were waterfall, and rill,\n Lifting on high each arm-like steep,\n Seemed in the general woe to weep.\n When the great sun, the lord of day,\n Saw R\u00e1van tear the dame away,\n His glorious light began to fail\n And all his disk grew cold and pale.\n 'If R\u00e1van from the forest hies**\n With R\u00e1ma's S\u00edt\u00e1 as his prize,\n Justice and truth have vanished hence,\n Honour and right and innocence.'\n Thus rose the cry of wild despair\n From spirits as they gathered there.\n In trembling troops in open lawns\n Wept, wild with woe, the startled fawns,\n And a strange terror changed the eyes\n They lifted to the distant skies.\n On silvan Gods who love the dell\n A sudden fear and trembling fell,\n As in the deepest woe they viewed\n The lady by the fiend subdued.\n Still in loud shrieks was heard afar\n That voice whose sweetness naught could\n mar,\n While eager looks of fear and woe\n She bent upon the earth below.\n The lady of each winning wile\n With pearly teeth and lovely smile,\n Seized by the lord of Lank\u00e1's isle,\n \u00a0\u00a0 Looked down for friends in vain.\n She saw no friend to aid her, none,\n Not R\u00e1ma nor the younger son\n Of Das'aratha, and undone\n \u00a0\u00a0 She swooned with fear and pain.\n \n \n \n \n291:1 The spirits of the good dwell in heaven until their store of accumulated merit is exhausted. Then they redescend to earth in the form of falling stars.\n291:2 See The Descent of Gang\u00e1, Book I Canto XLIV.","title":"BOOK III: Canto LII.: R\u00e1van's Flight.","type":"page"}