Moonrise over Lanka

Then the wise one sees the moon, risen to mid-sky, pouring out again and again its canopy of moonlight, like a rutting bull wandering in a cow-pen. He sees the cool-rayed moon moving across the sky, destroying the world’s sins, swelling the great ocean, making all beings shine. The beauty that shines on Mandara, on the ocean at evening, and on lotuses in the water shines now in the lovely moon. Like a swan in a silver cage, a lion in a cave of Mandara, a hero on a proud elephant, the moon shines in the sky. Like a bull with sharp horns, like the great white mountain with its lofty peak, like an elephant with tusks bound in gold, the moon shines with its horns full. Its stain of cold water and frost destroyed, its darkness taken away by the seizer of the great planets, its mark made pure by the shelter of radiant beauty, the blessed hare-marked moon shines. Like a lion reaching a rock, an elephant reaching a great battle, a king gaining his kingdom, so the radiant moon shines. The blessed evening, its faults removed by the bright moonrise, heaven-bright, increases the faults of the rakshasas who eat flesh, and the faults of hearts moved by lovely women. The strains of lutes, pleasant to the ear, have begun; virtuous women sleep with their husbands; and the night-rangers of wonderful, fierce conduct have begun to roam for pleasure. The wise monkey sees houses full of drunken and careless people, crowded with chariots, horses and fine seats, full of heroic glory. They hurl insults at one another, fling out their thick arms, throw out drunken babble and taunt each other. Rakshasas throw out their chests, throw their limbs over their lovers, take on many-coloured forms and draw their strong bows. He sees women anointing their lovers, others sleeping again, others laughing with lovely faces, others sighing in anger. The place shines with great trumpeting elephants, with the well-honoured and the good, with heroes breathing hard, like lakes with hissing serpents. In that city he sees yatudhanas foremost in understanding, of fine speech, full of faith, foremost in the world, of many kinds and lovely names. He rejoices to see them handsome, of many virtues befitting their natures, shining; and he sees some, again, who are ugly. Then he sees their women, worthy of the best, of pure feeling, of great dignity, devoted to their lovers and to drink, of good nature like stars. He sees women blazing, hidden by shame, embraced by their lovers at midnight, some embraced by women, as birds embraced by birds. Others sit on the roofs of mansions, sitting at ease in their lovers’ laps; others, devoted to dharma, sit by their husbands, filled with love. Some, uncovered, are the colour of streaks of gold; some, most precious, the colour of refined gold; some, separated from their lovers, the colour of the moon, with lovely limbs. The foremost monkey hero sees lovely women in the houses, joyful, delightful, full of love, having reached their delightful lovers. He sees rows of faces bright as the moon, rows of lovely eyes with curved, fine lashes, rows of ornaments like lovely rows of lightning.

But he does not see Sita, of the highest birth, born in a royal family that keeps to the path, the slender one, born of the mind, like a well-grown creeper in full flower; Sita, who keeps to the eternal path, whose eyes are only for Rama, filled with love, entered into her husband’s glorious heart, always above other women; tormented by heat, her throat choked with tears, who once wore a necklace of the finest gold, with fine lashes and a sweet voice, like a peahen dancing in the forest; like a crescent moon with its line unclear, like a streak of gold covered with dust, like the scar of a healed wound, like a line of cloud bent by the wind. Not seeing Sita, wife of Rama, lord of men, best of speakers, the leaper is struck with grief and for a while becomes dull.

Press › to begin with verse 1.

ततः स मध्यंगतमंशुमन्तंज्योत्स्नावितानं मुहुरुद्वमन्तम् ।ददर्श धीमान् भुवि भानुमन्तंगोष्ठे वृषं मत्तमिव भ्रमन्तम् ॥ १ ॥

Then the wise one saw the moon, gone to mid-sky, radiant, pouring out again and again its canopy of moonlight, the shining one, like a rutting bull wandering in a cow-pen.

This sarga is a virtuoso lyric written in rhyming verse, rare in Valmiki, in which nearly every line ends with the same sound. The rising moon is compared in a dozen images to a swan, a lion, a hero, a bull and an elephant. Its light reveals Lanka’s night life: drinkers and boasters, lovers embracing, quarrelling, sleeping. Hanuman sees the rakshasas as individuals, some handsome and learned, some ugly, and their women as varied as stars.

The point of all this beauty is its contrast. Among all these women he does not find Sita. The final images of her are among the most tender in the poem: “like a crescent moon with its line unclear, like a streak of gold covered with dust, like the scar of a healed wound”. The grief Hanuman feels on her behalf, though he has never seen her, shows how fully he has taken Rama’s cause as his own.

Sources. Valmiki Ramayana, Sundara Kanda, sarga 5 (southern recension, Gita Press numbering). Commentary by Vani Darshan, not scripture.