Atha Nilwan Guwan Wimanin Lyrics by Amaradeva

From the far blue mansion of the sky,
a jewel-light comes rising up,
a radiant future dawns bright,
in the name of my country and people

By tiring the two hands with work,
pouring the sweat of the body down,
let us go toward the mansion of fortune,
jewel-bright, breaking the darkness with light

This country of mine, my nation,
if that thought is not within you,
will the fragrant flowers of the national tree
bloom and spread to both ends of the world?

In the world built by your toil,
your children come to life,
on the day that world dawns, there,
is where the name of the nation is preserved

A stirring patriotic anthem about building the nation through honest labour, from the maestro Amaradeva. It opens on a hopeful vision: from the far blue mansion of the sky, a jewel-light comes rising, and a radiant future dawns, in the name of my country and people. The future is imagined as light breaking over the land.

The middle names how that future is earned, not by fortune but by work. By tiring the two hands with work, pouring the sweat of the body down, it says, let us go toward the mansion of fortune, jewel-bright, breaking the darkness with light. Prosperity is the reward of sweat and effort.

The close turns it into a moral appeal. If the thought this country of mine, my nation is not truly in you, it asks, will the fragrant flowers of the national tree ever bloom and spread to both ends of the world? For in the world built by your toil, your children come to life, and only when that world dawns is the name of the nation preserved. Sung by W. D. Amaradeva to words by Madawala S. Rathnayake (from a 1969 radio Nirmana Gee programme), it is a dignified, uplifting patriotic classic about love of country expressed through hard work, and a future built by one’s own hands for one’s children.