Sharabhanga Installs the Forest Form of Rama within His Heart
Aranya Kanda, Doha 8
Doha 8 · Movement 2 of 2
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Before relinquishing the body, Sharabhanga asks for a presence that death cannot remove. He beholds Rama dark as a rain-filled cloud, with Sita and the younger brother beside him.
This is the saguna form he invites to dwell continually within his heart. He does not ask the forest scene to dissolve into an unnamed vastness. Bow, companionship, color, relation, and beauty are carried intact into the innermost sanctuary.
The prayer makes the heart wider than the path and steadier than the body about to burn. Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana can remain there without departure. The outer meeting reaches its appointed end, while the beloved configuration is established inwardly as an unbroken vision.
The body approaches flame, but the rain-dark Lord with Sita and Lakshmana has already entered the deathless chamber of the heart.
Read the passage from the Manas
सीता अनुज समेत प्रभु नील जलद तनु स्याम। मम हियँ बसहु निरंतर सगुनरुप श्रीराम।।8।।
O Lord, with Sita and your younger brother Lakshmana, your body dark and beautiful as a rain-filled cloud, dwell forever in the sky of my heart, like a still and desireless moon.