The Anonymous People

We

Are the anonymous people
No photographs
No paintings
To record our past
Our fore fathers
Collected no stamps

No public wall
Bears our Name
No awards to us
In public games

We
Are the anonymous people
Our fathers were the same

Ages of suffering
Connect us to the past
No memories of us
But our world is vast

We
Are the anonymous people
Silence in our mask.

- Basil Fernando -
Sri Lankan Literature in English (1948 -1998) published by the Department of Cultural Affairs