Chapter Eight: Literature of the Rasika Tradition in Hindi

I remain staring like a wooden doll, forgetting place, condition, and all else.
I find no peace day or night—when will you meet me and clasp me to your breast?
Beholding your beauty, dark beloved, my heart finds no repose.
Day and night nothing else pleases me—who has played this trick?
My eyes remain thirsty, longing to drink the sweetness of your mouth.
Baijnath sacrifices himself to the beloved youth and drinks the water of love.

Today Rama shines beside Sita.
They sit upon a divine golden throne set with jewels, the support of every happiness.
A crown rests upon his head and a lovely moon ornament upon hers; both faces are abodes of delight.
Heroic earrings and a nose ornament shine beside his lips, while at her left the nose-ring gleams.
A bindī adorns her forehead and a musk mark his; paired flower garlands rest at their throats.
A Vaijayanti forest garland, pendant, and lovely moon necklace adorn his chest.
Golden bracelets, armlets, rings, and many other ornaments beautify his arms.
Anklets ring upon their feet; yellow cloth clothes him and a dark-coloured veil adorns her.
Seeing the beloved’s raincloud beauty, a blue cloud is ashamed; at his left she shines with lightning’s complexion.
Baijnath beholds this sweetness and offers to it every tale of Rati and Love.

Śrī Rāmavilāsa

This forty-page work by Thakur Mathura Prasad Singh of Chaugadwa in Basti district, composed in dohās and caupāīs, may be called a short version of the Rāmacaritamānasa. It relates Rama’s life in simple, lucid verse. Composition began on Rama Navami in the month of Chaitra, Vikrama Samvat 1964.

Its description of Rama’s wedding procession is deeply affecting. The work’s greatest distinction is the vivid and attractive joking exchanged with Janaki’s companions during Sri Rama’s wedding in Janakpur. Its descriptions of Sri Rama and Sri Janaki from toenails to crown are no less captivating.

In Vikrama year nineteen hundred and sixty-four, in the beautiful month of Chaitra,
On the lunar day of Rama’s birth, I joyfully begin describing Rama’s virtues.

The poet attempts to count the multitude in Rama’s wedding procession:
One and a half crore companies of elephants, and thirty crore excellent horses.
Twenty-five crore splendid palanquins glitter,
Followed by seven crore twenty-five lakh bearers carrying loads.