Itihāsa / Rāmāyaṇa chronicle / Bāla · 6 of 50
6. The marriages
Bāla (बाल)
Daśaratha comes. The marriage is four marriages, because the poem likes a symmetry. Rāma and Sītā. Lakṣmaṇa and Ūrmilā, Janaka's other daughter. Bharata and Māṇḍavī. Śatrughna and Śrutakīrti. The last two are cousins of Sītā, in the genealogy the poem uses. A court that came to fetch one bride goes home with a generation paired off.
The wedding day has a household life of its own in Janakpur, Vivāha Pañcamī. This page stays with the poem's fact. Vows are taken. A father who feared he would die childless walks behind four sons and four daughters-in-law. Kaikeyī's son is married with the others. Nothing in the feast knows what her maid is going to say, years on.
There is a road still between Mithilā and Ayodhyā. The poem does not let them arrive quietly.
नेपालीमा
विवाह चारवटा भए। राम र सीता। लक्ष्मण र ऊर्मिला। भरत र माण्डवी। शत्रुघ्न र श्रुतकीर्ति। पछिल्ला दुई सीताका चचेरी बहिनी हुन्। जनकपुरको घरेलु पर्व अर्को पृष्ठ हो। कविताको तथ्य: प्रतिज्ञा भए। चार छोरा र चार बुहारी लिएर बाबु हिँडे। कैकेयीका छोराको पनि सँगै विवाह भयो। भोजलाई वर्षौंपछि कैकेयीकी दासीले के भन्नेछे भन्ने थाहा छैन।