Shloka 26
अभिमन्युविलापः (Abhimanyu-vilāpa) — Uttarā’s lament, observed and framed by Gandhārī
नूनमप्सरसां स्वर्गे मनांसि प्रमथिष्यसि । परमेण च रूपेण गिरा च स्मितपूर्वया,“निश्चय ही स्वर्गमें जाकर आप अपने सुन्दर रूप और मन्द मुसकानयुक्त मधुर वाणीके द्वारा वहाँकी अप्सराओंके मनको मथ डालेंगे
nūnam apsarasāṃ svarge manāṃsi pramathiṣyasi | parameṇa ca rūpeṇa girā ca smitapūrvayā |
Vaiśaṃpāyana said: “Surely, when you go to heaven, you will churn and unsettle the hearts of the Apsarases there—by your unsurpassed beauty and by your sweet speech, preceded by a gentle smile.” In the widows’ lament of the Strī-parvan, this line underscores how extraordinary charm and virtue can be imagined as transcending even the battlefield’s ruin, yet it also carries an ethical poignancy: praise of beauty is voiced amid grief, revealing the tension between worldly allure and the tragic cost of war.
वैशम्पायन उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights the power of beauty and gentle speech to move minds, while—within the Strī-parvan’s mourning—also reminding the reader that such praise arises amid irreversible loss, sharpening the ethical contrast between human suffering and imagined heavenly reward.
Vaiśaṃpāyana narrates a remark that the addressed person, upon reaching heaven, will captivate even the celestial Apsarases through exceptional beauty and smiling, sweet words—an image set against the broader backdrop of post-war lamentation in the Strī-parvan.