Araliya Landata Lyrics

When the moon rises over the araliya grove
When the bees go circling the flowers on the trees
As I count on my fingers, hundreds and hundreds and thousands
I remember you.. and then
The words of a song come to me…

In the chena field, when the ears of grain ripen golden
When the parrots call among the mango blossoms
As I look for shade under the domba trees
I remember you, and then
My thoughts take flight…

When the moon rises over the araliya grove… //

When the scent of wild honeycombs hanging from branch and vine reaches me
When the stars come out in the pale golden sky
Unable even to cry, as I cover both my eyes
I remember you, and then
A dream is born….

When the moon rises over the araliya grove… //

The moon has come up over a grove of araliya trees, bees are still working the flowers, and a woman sits counting them off on her fingers, hundreds, then thousands. The counting is just something to keep her hands busy while she holds a thought at bay, and the thought arrives anyway. She remembers him, and the words of a song start forming in her.

That is the shape of every verse. Something in the village reaches her senses first, and only then does the memory land. In the second verse it is the chena field with the grain ripening, parrots calling in the mango blossom, the cool shade under the domba trees. In the third it is the smell of wild honey hanging on branch and vine, and stars coming out in a pale gold sky. The countryside is going through its ordinary year exactly as it always did. Nothing out there has changed. Only she has.

The araliya is the temple flower, the one people pick for offerings, and its scent carries furthest in the evening, so the very first image sets her in a quiet, almost sacred hour of the day. The choice of what the memory becomes is the loveliest part of the writing. First it becomes song words, then thoughts taking flight, then a dream. In Sinhala those three land as near-rhymes (sihiwenawa, sithiwili, sihinaya), so the ear hears remembering, thinking and dreaming as one continuous thing, each one a step further from him being actually present.

By the last verse the feeling has hardened. “Unable even to cry, as I cover both my eyes” is the line that gives it away, because this is grief that has been carried long enough to go dry. She has no tears left to spend on it, only the habit of shutting her eyes when it comes. And what she gets in return is a dream, which is the one place left where she can still see him. Nothing is resolved. The moon will come up over the araliya grove again tomorrow, the bees will circle, and she will count on her fingers again.