Raa Tharakawo Lyrics by Clarence Wijewardena

The night stars peeked down and watched
Why are your eyes wet with tears?
Yesterday, in the light of day, in our own world
streams of longing flowed and met….//

Don’t shed those tears, don’t cry, my dear
It is I who will one day take those hands of yours
The longing is so great, the patience wears thin
the two of us became one, bound on our own….

The night stars peeked down and watched…

Will you still know this love of mine?
Will you wait the way you did yesterday?
In a corner of my heart there is a tear
in a way I never imagined, never wished for….

The night stars peeked down and watched…

A young man is sitting with the girl he loves and she is in tears, and the song is his attempt to steady her. He opens by turning to the night sky, the stars leaning down to watch her cry, and asking gently why her eyes are wet. Only the day before, he reminds her, their two worlds had finally come together, their longing for each other flowing into one stream. So why the sadness now?

The reason becomes clear as he speaks. They are being separated, or kept apart, and she is afraid this love will not survive the wait. He answers her fear with a promise: stop crying, because one day it is his hand that will take hers, his and no one else’s. That image of taking her hands is the Sinhala way of saying he will marry her, that this is meant to end at a wedding, not in goodbye. His longing is huge and his patience is almost gone, and yet he holds to the belief that they were always meant to be one, bound together without anyone arranging it.

The flowing water in the second line is worth noticing. Sinhala love songs reach for the river and the stream again and again as the picture of feeling that cannot be held back, two currents meeting and becoming a single flow. Here it tells you their love was not a small thing but something that joined them completely, which is exactly why the threat of losing it hurts so much.

The last verse is where his own composure cracks. He has been the strong one telling her not to cry, but now he asks the questions he is most afraid of. Will you still recognise my love? Will you still wait for me the way you did before? And he admits that in a corner of his own heart sits a tear too, a grief he never saw coming and never wanted. That quiet confession is what gives the song its weight. He comforts her with one breath and lets you see his own fear with the next, and you are left holding the ache of two people who love each other and are not sure the world will let them keep it.