Obatai Me Aradana Lyrics by Rohana Bogoda

(This is my invitation to you
This is my plea to you …//)
As long as the sun and moon remain
As long as we walk this saṃsāra (the cycle of rebirth) together
I cannot stay angry with you
This is my invitation to you
This is my plea to you…

(The love we shared, because of a little hurt,
has only grown deeper than it was before..//)
(You who bring my heart its peace,
your gentle smile is my good fortune…//)

This is my invitation to you…/

(Even if the two of us quarrelled yesterday,
let us never quarrel again…//)
(So the pain never returns,
your gentle smile is my good fortune…//)

This is my invitation to you…/

A young man is reaching out to the woman he loves after a fight, asking her to let go of the anger and come back to him. The whole song is one long, tender invitation. He is not defending himself or arguing about who was right. He simply says, in so many words, I cannot stay angry with you, so please don’t stay angry with me.

The promise he makes is the heart of it. He says he will not be angry for as long as the sun and the moon last, and for as long as the two of them travel through saṃsāra, the Buddhist cycle of birth and rebirth, together. In Sinhala love songs this is the deepest vow a person can make. It stretches the bond far past this one life and this one quarrel, all the way across countless lifetimes, the way a couple in Sri Lanka might say they want to be together “in every birth to come.” Against a promise that big, yesterday’s argument shrinks to nothing.

Then he turns the fight itself into something good. The love they shared, he says, has only grown deeper because of that small hurt, the way a wound healing leaves the skin closer-knit than before. He keeps returning to one image: her smile. He calls her gentle smile his vasana, his good fortune or blessing, the thing that settles his heart and makes him feel lucky. It is her smile he is really asking for back, not just her forgiveness.

By the last verse the plea becomes a quiet pact between the two of them. They quarrelled yesterday, fine, but let them never quarrel again, so the pain never has a reason to return. What stays with you is how soft the whole thing is. There is no blame in it, only a man who would rather make peace than be right, holding out his hand and hoping she takes it.