Noena Bawa

This night is a song whose words and phrases have gone mute,
drawn close to the window, sitting at my lord’s feet,
that, right there, is love,
am I right, Kanthaka?

The tear that joined the coldest wind,
did you see it, Kanthaka?
that, right there, is love

Knowing well that he will not come,
she sits on the road her lord went down,
isn’t it a wonder, Kanthaka?
that, right there, is love

This is a tender, sorrowful song built on a single striking image: it is addressed to Kanthaka, the faithful horse who carried Prince Siddhartha away on the night he left the palace. Through that horse, the song speaks about a love that stays behind and keeps waiting.

The night itself has gone mute, a song whose words have fallen silent, and the one left behind sits close to the window at her lord’s feet, and calls that stillness love. Turning to Kanthaka, she asks again and again, am I right?, as if the horse alone understands. The middle holds one image: a tear folding into the cold night wind. Did you see it, Kanthaka? she asks. And that, too, she says, is love, love reduced to a single tear the night almost carries off.

The last verse is the heart of it. Knowing perfectly well that he will not come back, she still sits on the very road he left down, waiting. Isn’t it a wonder? The song frames devotion as exactly this: waiting faithfully on an empty road for someone who is not returning, the way Kanthaka once waited for a master who had gone. Sung by Chamilka Gayathri, composed by Tharindu Damsara to words by Kaveeshwa Rashmith, it is a quiet, aching meditation on faithful, hopeless love.