Kausalya Calls the Forest Companions as Dear as Rama
Uttara Kanda, Doha 9
Doha 9 · Movement 2 of 2
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The companions who stood beside Rama in the forest and in Lanka bend their human forms before Kausalya. Heads that faced the weapons of demons now touch the feet of the mother whose son they helped bring home.
Kausalya blesses them with delight. You are as dear to me as Raghunath himself, she says. In that maternal sentence, vanaras, bears, and Lanka's righteous king are received into Ayodhya not as foreign allies but as the family created by Rama's exile.
A dense rain of flowers descends from the sky as Rama, the very root of happiness, proceeds toward the palace. Men and women climb the high terraces and rooftops until the city rises in layers of watching faces. Below moves the returning Lord. Above drifts the celestial shower. Between earth and heaven, every balcony becomes a place of darshan, and every lifted gaze follows joy on its way home.
Kausalya's blessing makes the army a family, while all Ayodhya climbs upward to watch happiness pass beneath falling flowers.
Read the passage from the Manas
कौसल्या के चरनन्हि पुनि तिन्ह नायउ माथ।। आसिष दीन्हे हरषि तुम्ह प्रिय मम जिमि रघुनाथ।।8(क)।। सुमन बृष्टि नभ संकुल भवन चले सुखकंद। चढ़ी अटारिन्ह देखहिं नगर नारि नर बृंद।।8(ख)।।
Then they bowed their heads at Kausalya's feet. She blessed them joyfully: 'You are as dear to me as Raghunath himself.' 8(ka) Flowers rained thick from the sky as the fountain of bliss proceeded homeward. Crowds of men and women climbed to their rooftops to behold him. 8(kha)