Homeland

Somewhere

The state of our homeland

Becomes a conversation piece

(Have you heard the latest on the Geneva Report?)

For people to deplore

And pity

And we frown.

Why can’t they also cherish and celebrate

We ask,

With the smell of the sea

And the taste of thambili

(not iced please)

With the sound of papare

(at an ear-splitting decibel)

And the feel of pride

When the bat and ball come out to play

Why can’t they talk of the warm sun

(preferably under 32 degrees)

The laughing children
Isso wade spicy and steaming
(dekkak denda)

We demand?

After all we live here

And we don’t deplore and scold

But somewhere in our lives

We forgot that

We began to learn to live with the sounds of despair

(Ayio another bomb blast)

Accept blood-soaked retribution

Fail to see the hopelessness

(That’s how things are no)

People have in their eyes

We cluck and caw

And sigh and deplore

(Don't know what things are coming to men)

For a minute or two

And then go back to our lives

(So have you heard the latest on the Perera wedding?)

And say there is nothing we can do

Somewhere far away

People talk of our land in parliaments

Like they know

And we frown

(These bloody Westerners!)

But still

We do nothing

We hear them deplore and pity

And the hopelessness grows

While we do 
Nothing
At 
All.