by Vaishnavi Rajendran
And so it came, the Sun God’s gift,
A day so bright: Deliverance Day;
The sky and land were awash with light,
Happiness gained and injustice slain.
As the Sun moved on from its eastern home,
Nandigram exulted like never before
To the sound of hooves, of kinsmen’s feet,
Ayodhya danced to Bharat’s abode.
There came Shatrugna, radiance personified,
There were Kousalya and Sumithra alight with joy,
There was Kaikeyi waiting for her eldest son,
With evil and malice and vengeance destroyed.
Listening to the rumble, there he stood
Eyes seeking the horizon, Dashrath’s son,
The very brother of brothers, he waited with heart,
With tingling nerves; his penance done.
Bharat renewed his vow for the millionth time,
The echo of it burned fierce in his throat,
If his brother failed to come, he would leave this world;
His broken spirit could endure no more.
Then in the distance, there came a sight
That the world was waiting for, for many a day
A cloud of dust rose up to the sky,
Khosala’s King was on his way.
And in that moment when the forms took shape,
Across the bare plains some miles ahead,
The earth stood still and all life froze,
Just the beat of hearts and words unsaid.
Here they could see the flash of an eye!
And there they could see hovering gold!
Pushpak rose from the cloud like the sun,
With the three that they’d loved; the three that they’d lost.
At last they could see the Vimana’s form,
At last they could behold their good Lord’s face,
And Khosala broke its fourteen year fast,
And wept and cried and laughed in a daze.
As the Pushpak landed with the sun at its back
Nandigram ran to meet and greet,
With the slippers on his head, with tears rolling down,
Bharat fell with a sob at Rama’s feet.
Rama embraced his brother tight,
His eyes brimming with tears unleashed,
He was home at last and appeasing fast,
The filial hunger of years fourteen.
The mothers rejoiced, the repentant and wronged,
As one for the return of Dashrath’s sons,
They of might, the just and brave,
With the wisdom of years and hardships won.
He first went to the one that’d brought him up,
When Kaikeyi cried, the Devas cried,
He now embraced the one from whose womb he came,
When Kousalya cried, Mahadev Himself cried.
And the cold, hard fist over Khosala’s heart,
The cold hard mist over Rama’s land,
Broke and yielded to the Lord’s return,
Vanished in front of Rama’s hand.
“On to Ayodhya!”, cried Bharat loud,
And the citizens took up the joyous refrain,
“On to Ayodhya!”, resounded the cry,
The horses and elephants began their way.
And yonder waited she, lit by the Sun,
Its amber nestling on her walls,
She has waited long and waited true,
Our Lord’s pride Ayodhya of Khosala!
