Lanka Torched

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.