Obata Thiyena Aadare Lyrics by MS Fernando

Let me tell you the love I hold for you
let me write it for you on a palmyra leaf plucked from a tree
let me see your lovely smile for just a moment
I feel like a little bird, I want to fly to you

You never thought of going on a journey alone
you never thought you’d stay away for so long once you’d gone
this is a beautiful world of the gods, isn’t it lovely to me
being with you is like rowing a boat at the ferry crossing
the sky is so high, the palace lacks nothing
I never lived without seeing girls who sing and play and dance
like a village with no carts and few vehicles
being with you is like rowing a boat at the ferry crossing

I don’t look up at the sky on a moonlit night
you don’t know the ache of not being able to look
between her face and your face there’s no real difference
being with you is like rowing a boat at the ferry crossing
even though my body is here, my mind is not here
when I come back, she gave you to me again
the day to see my lovely one is not far off
being with you is like rowing a boat at the ferry crossing

A young man is pouring out his love to the woman he adores, and he wants her to know how real it is. He starts simply, almost shyly: let me tell you how much I love you, let me write it down for you. He even reaches for a palmyra leaf, the old leaf people once wrote on, as if a passing line on paper could never be enough and he needs something more lasting to carry the words. One glimpse of her smile and he feels light as a bird, ready to take wing toward her.

The line that anchors the whole song is the one that keeps coming back: being with her is like rowing a boat at the ferry crossing. In village life a small boat gliding across calm water at the river ferry is the picture of ease and quiet contentment, no rush, no struggle, just a gentle, steady drift. That is what her company feels like to him. Around that image he piles up everything the world calls grand, the sky stretching high, a palace that wants for nothing, the singers and dancers and the comings and goings of a busy place, and he sets it all against the simple peace of being beside her. None of the grandeur moves him. A quiet life with her is worth more than any of it.

In the last turn the longing sharpens. He no longer even looks up at the moon on a clear night, the very thing lovers usually gaze at, because she is not there to share it, and he tells her she cannot know how much that absence hurts. He admits his body is in one place while his mind is somewhere else entirely, always with her. Then comes a soft note of hope: the day he gets to see his lovely one again is not far away. It is the love of an ordinary man who has no riches to offer, only the certainty that her company is the one thing that makes him feel complete, and the comfort that the wait will soon be over.