Kausalya Stands Like a Golden Vine Struck by Frost
Ayodhya Kanda, Doha 163
Doha 163 · Movement 2 of 2
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Kausalya wears soiled garments. Grief has drained her color, bent her frail body, and made every movement bear the weight of loss.
She resembles a golden vine within a beautiful grove after frost has struck it. The original radiance remains visible, but cold devastation has entered every leaf and stem.
Bharata approaches the mother whose son was exiled in his name. Before a word passes between them, her form reveals the cost of the boon that was meant to favor him. The palace garden has not merely lost its flower; its living gold has been bowed almost to the earth.
Before Bharata, Kausalya's golden form bends beneath grief like a tender vine after a killing frost.
Read the passage from the Manas
मलिन बसन बिबरन बिकल कृस सरीर दुख भार। कनक कलप बर बेलि बन मानहुँ हनी तुसार।।163।।
In soiled garments, pale and distraught, her frail body bent beneath the weight of sorrow, like a golden creeper in a lovely grove struck down by frost.