ଶ୍ରୀ ରାହୁ ସ୍ତୋତ୍ରମ୍

A short hymn to Rahu which begins by saluting exactly what he is: salutation to you in the form of a daitya; I bow to the enemy of the gods; salutation to the devourer of all, to the one of terrible form. Only after that does it make the identification these planet-hymns turn on, that he is Brahma and Varuna and Vishnu and Hari and Shiva, and pleased with the world of mortals he carries people across. One verse gives his power in a single image — hill-forts and difficult places, towns and cities, are turned to ash in an instant by the force of his anger — and another his colour, smoke-hued, red-eyed, tawny, a cruel seizer and terrible, in the shape of Yama. Its closing verses are astrological and name the houses, the fifth and the sixth and the third, that his standing in them concerns.