Short Poems

Thy muse not-able, full, il-lustred rimes,
Make thee the poet — aster of our times.

Loue, Cypris, Phaebus, will feede, decke, and crowne
Thy heart, browes, verse, with flames, with flowrs, renowne.

Those powers of the air that silent vigil keep,
Roaming the long dim-galleried halls of sleep,
Bore me on their mysterious wings, one night,
Where pale voluminous vapors, huge of height,
Wrapt with solemnity no eye could pierce,
A dialogue of deep voices, proud and fierce.

Even such is Time who takes in trust
our youth, our Joyes and all we have,
Then payes us bake with age and Dust,
Who in a darke and silent Grave
When wee have wandred all our wayes
Shuts up the storie of our Dayes.
But from Times rage, the Grave and Dust
My God shall raise me up I trust.

Yeoven suche ys tyme which takes in haste
our youth our joyes, and all wee have
And paies us but with age and duste
whoe in the darke and silent grave
When we have wandered all our waies
shutts up the storie of our daies
And from which earth and grave and dust
the Lord shall raise me up I trust

(Rama's Return and Consecration) The real Epic ends with the war, and with Rama's happy return to Ayodhya. Sita proves her stainless virtue by an Ordeal of Fire, and returns with her lord and with Lakshman in an airial car, which Ravan had won from the Gods, and which Bibhishan made over to Rama. Indian poets are never tired of descriptions of nature, and the poet of the Ramayana takes advantage of Rama's journey from Ceylon to Oudh to give us a bird's-eye view of the whole continent of India, as well as to recapitulate the principal incidents of his great Epic.

(The War in Ceylon) Rama crossed over with his army from India to Ceylon. There is a chain of islands across the strait, and the Indian poet supposes them to be the remains of a vast causeway which Rama built to cross over with his army.

The town of Lanka, the capital of Ceylon, was invested, and the war which followed was a succession of sallies by the great leaders and princes of Lanka. But almost every sally was repulsed, every chief was killed, and at last Ravan himself who made the last sally was slain and the war ended.

(The Council of War) Ravan was thoroughly frightened by the deeds of Hanuman. For Hanuman had not only penetrated into his island and discovered Sita in her imprisonment, but had also managed to burn down a great portion of the city before he left the island. Ravan called a Council of War, and as might be expected, all the advisers heedlessly advised war.

(Sita Discovered) Among the many chiefs sent by Sugriva in different directions in search of Sita, Hanuman succeeded in the quest and discovered Sita in Ceylon. Ceylon is separated from India by a broad channel of the sea, and Hanuman leaped, or rather flew through the air, across the channel, and lighted on the island. Sita, scorning the proposals of Ravan, was kept in confinement in a garden of Asoka trees, surrounded by a terrible guard of Raksha females; and in this hard confinement she remained true and faithful to her lord.

(In the Nilgiri Mountains) R AMA'S wanderings in the Nilgiri mountains, and his alliance with Sugriva the chief of these regions, form the subject of the Book. With that contempt for aboriginal races which has marked civilized conquerors in all ages, the poet describes the dwellers of these regions as monkeys and bears.