No Vanara Can See Another Inside the Demons' Darkness
Lanka Kanda, Doha 46
Doha 46 · Movement 2 of 2
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Dense darkness seals all ten directions. The battlefield that moments before flashed with weapons and many colored bodies becomes a single depth without horizon, gate, ground, or sky.
Confusion enters the monkey army. No warrior can see the companion beside him, the enemy before him, or the commander whose voice had ordered the charge. Separation is complete even while thousands stand close together.
Cries rise everywhere from within the blackness. Each voice seeks another voice, but the illusion gives no form back to sound. The host remains powerful, yet power without sight cannot find its path. For one suspended moment, the siege narrows into the bewilderment of beings unable to recognize one another, waiting for Rama to make the world visible again.
Ten directions disappear, and the army becomes a field of voices calling for forms the darkness has taken away.
Read the passage from the Manas
देखि निबिड़ तम दसहुँ दिसि कपिदल भयउ खभार। एकहि एक न देखई जहँ तहँ करहिं पुकार।।46।।
Seeing dense darkness in all ten directions, the monkey army fell into confusion. None could see another; everywhere they cried out in alarm.