Lanka Torched Poem by Sathya Narayana

LANKA TORCHED
Let me express my love and gratitude
to Lord Agni, who showed mercy on me.
Let me offer these hordes of Lankans, lewd
and Lankan artistry to fire's wild spree.'
The Mighty Hanuman with burning tail
was looking like a golden nimbus cloud
holding the lightning sword, on cosmic sail
about to burst on demons, wild and loud.
He hopped from one rooftop to another
wagging his blazing tail with playful mind
eluding frantic demons; some smothered
by fear and some with hope on life, resigned.
He lighted first Prahasta's house, then perched
on huge Mahaparshwa's rooftop and torched.

The flames soared high and spinning smokes diffused
filling the air with acrid smell and sounds
of crackling wood as demons looked bemused;
as Hanuman cut loose for further rounds.
Enraged, he set ablaze the lovely home
of vile Vajradamshtra; from there he jumped
to reach Suka's exclusive palace dome
and turned that fort into a melted lump.
He turned to Sarana's quarters and lit
that home, then set his eyes on Indrajit's
lavish abode and burnt it to ashes.
Within minutes Lanka was all flashes.
Thus offered the demon homes to fierce infernal streams
but spared Vibheeshana's abode, with due esteem.

The God of Fire and the God of Wind who spent
till then, a timid existence, oppressed
by Ravana, regained a strong accent
by Mother's grace and Hanuman's finesse.
Those gods went berserk with triumphant smirks
enraged with vengeance, spitting purple fires.
As the flames rose high and sharp like wielded dirks;
the helping winds had whirled shaking the spires.
The Son of Wind once finished with sundry homes
reached the high and highly wrought palace
of Ravana touching the misty foams
of sky and torched its spires with great malice.
The One who's sent to find the Mother chaste
didn't stop at that, but burnt a city great.


The holocaust began with the crashing down
of roofs, marking the doom of that boom-town.
Melted gold spires and silver sills flowed
on streets and littered boulevards and roads.
Ran helter-skelter kids and women, through
the burning wood and falling roofs, askew
with strident shrieks and cries begging for help
in chorus with horse neighs and mongrels' yelps.
Some women caught on upper stairs of forts
had jumped from noisome heights like rain of borts,1
falling from misty skies, with raucous cries,
"This Ape's the God of Fire, in wile disguise! "
When fruits of past good deeds exhaust and sins upraise
how fall the blessed castles; the devilish walls thus did raze.