Tea Stained Lines is an anthology of poems written by young writers from Sri Lanka’s Hill Country Tamil community.
The poems in this anthology were originally written in Tamil—the mother tongue of the community—and have been carefully translated into English (and also into Sinhala) to reach wider audiences. Through these verses, the young writers reveal their lived realities, their struggles, and the beauty of a culture that has survived generations of hardship while holding onto resilience and hope.
"Our focus with this inaugural project is on exploring and amplifying the profound cultural heritage of resilliant people who face trials of marginilisation and linguistic isolation with courage, creativity and grace"
Gayani Palliyaarachi, Translation and Linguistic Committee Chair, Pen Sri Lanka
The anthology was developed and published by PEN Sri Lanka, as part of its commitment to giving marginalized voices a platform and connecting them to the wider global community of writers. By sharing Tea Stained Lines with the Tomorrow Club, we hope to bring these original voices from the tea estates into dialogue with PEN’s International network, affirming the importance of diversity, recognition, and freedom of expression in literature.
That day is not far off
Do you know the speed of the pulse in my people? Can you feel the amplitude of their emotions? Does your rusted brain know the vision they behold about these mountains?
For how much have you sold, their smiles, pain, labour, and desires?
Do you know the story of them who walks carrying the winds of this land on their shoulders?
Have you ever walked on a sunny noon between these mountains? Have you ever passed these mountains at night?
Have you felt the smell of sweat that falls, melting rocks and soil? Have you ever touched their hands?
Have you seen how they live suffocated, by the smell of urine that comes from the end of the ‘Laima?’
Have you ever sat under a Pinus or a ‘Murunga’tree and listened to their stories? The stories that console the wearied souls and bodies in the evenings. Will you ever understand those beautiful stories? Have you spent at least one night in a ‘Laima’ room? How do you write their age-old story? How do you sing their songs of suffering? Can you speak about the history they built, by levelling hills and planting trees?
As a river that does not flow, do you think of keeping them stagnant?
Inquiring them about their sufferings, With tearing eyes and heated blood, To sing about their freedom, I come forth...
That day is not far off ....
By - Su. Thavachelvan
The Fragrance of Weariness
Down the road,
Where the sun's fierce blaze unfurls,
For a man hauling a laden cart,
What does the fragrance of noon mean?
For him, it is but the smell of sweat,
Pressed from his tired flesh.
As rain descends,
veiling sight in its cascade,
Ask a woman filling the plucking basket,
About the fragrance of rain.
It is for her, the smell of a rain-drenched body,
And the smell of pungent blood
That oozes from the stings of Leeches' relentless bite.
For one who lives from hand to mouth,
For one who toils hard to survive,
The fragrance of life
Is but the smell of hunger,
What else can it be?
Beside the essence
Of weariness,
What meaning can
Other fragrances hold?
-By – S N Krishnapriyan
My December
No one
Should disturb
My December morning.
No one
Should shout from
The nearby garden.
Beneath the covers, I
Engage in discussion
With the chill that arrested me,
And then will emerge.
Until then,
Do not assail me.
Like buds, refreshed in dew's embrace,
Eyes will open with a single smile's grace.
The sun,
Hastening to unveil the dawn
Throughout the months...
Yet come December, softly lies,
With eyes in restful guise...
In December’s bath
Till the first droplet on the skin dwells,
Thirty tremors, the mind shivers
in icy cold.
At noon, December's rage
Gently wanes,
But still,
The cold seeps into the feet...
In the month of December,
Not only water,
But the tears, too, have grown cold...
Celebrate those tears,
Together with the chill.
By -Biruntha Rajagopalan
Breaking Silence...
At night,
one among ten thousand daytimes,
that did not slip through, emerge...
My people,
who sowed the seeds of tea buds,
Clearing the mountains,
And their unvoiced silence...
When the authoritarian class that holds office,
ruling over the hills,
Sets the fires of suffering on our roofs
Roam our lands with force and violence
Disrespect us with mean words
The fire within the hut spread through us...
The locks chained by
The chants made with the greed for power,
will be opened.
The tips of the match sticks
rubbed with the sound of salvation
will ignite and explode,
opening the floodgates of
our Unvoiced Silence...
By -Mu Keerthiyan
📖 Full collection available in print or as an eBook.
📬 To request a printed copy or learn more, contact: PEN Sri Lanka at [email protected]
