Guru Pata Handawa Lyrics by Senaka Batagoda

If your face takes shape in the brown-coloured dusk,
if there is no one at all on this brown-earth road this evening,
I stay here all alone,
bathed in the darkness,
I’ll recite folk-verses to my loneliness

If the lovers of Isurumuniya still whisper their words of love,
if the far-seen horizon is still just there,
bathed in the moonlight, alone among the stars,
oh, how I long to fly

If you are near me, my sorrow is very far away,
if my heart weeps, it means you are not near,
the heart has no room to think much more,
and even if it thinks, not much would change,
you are only for me, only for me,
my own heart tells me so

If your face takes shape in the brown-coloured dusk,
if there is no one at all on this brown-earth road this evening,
I stay here all alone,
bathed in the darkness,
I’ll recite folk-verses to my loneliness

If your heart is happy,
I feel it clearly,
and if your heart weeps,
I cannot bear it

The heart has no room to think much more,
and even if it thinks, not much would change,
I am me, and you are you,
and yet we are one and the same

If your face takes shape in the brown-coloured dusk,
if there is no one at all on this brown-earth road this evening,
I stay here all alone,
bathed in the darkness,
I’ll recite folk-verses to my loneliness

A tender, lonely love song by Senaka Batagoda, set in the melancholy glow of dusk. Its whole mood is in the title, guru paata handawa, the brown-coloured evening: if her face forms in that fading light, and if the earth-road is empty of everyone this evening, then he sits alone, bathed in the darkness, and, in a lovely image, promises to recite seepada, folk-verses, to his own loneliness for company.

The middle reaches for the eternal and the free. If the stone lovers of Isurumuniya still whisper their love, and the far horizon is still where it always was, then, bathed in moonlight and alone among the stars, how he longs to fly. And the heart of it: when she is near, his sorrow is far; when his heart weeps, it only means she is gone. There’s no room left to overthink it, and no point, only you, my heart tells me, only you.

The close is quiet attunement. If her heart is happy, he feels it clearly; if it weeps, he cannot bear it, love as complete sympathy. And it ends on the paradox that holds every deep bond: I am me, and you are you, and yet we are one and the same. Sung by Senaka Batagoda, it is a soft, aching song about loving someone so wholly that their joy and grief become your own, sung out to the loneliness of a brown-lit evening.