Clothes Of Sand

Obviously, to many artists - specially those from the sixties -, the use of drugs is reflected somehow in their creation. But Nick Drake wasn't the kind of artist who wrote about drug addiction or usage, he was a poet, he studied literature.

His concern about the meaning, the placement, the rhymes and, mainly, the feelings of every single word in his compositions, was too big for him just write about some drug experience.

Nick Drake is not the kind of artist who writes about concrete things or about the everyday, even figuratively,

I think this song is about God and the humankind. who, in general, turned away from the Promissed Land.

Morocco is on North Africa, but in the opposite side of the Middle East. Not so far geographically, indeed, but still far, thinking about the "promissed land".

Think about it, the different societies which developed for thousands of years at the middle east - with own policies, economics, religions, etc - became the most influential societies in the ocident, this societys beliefs and thoughts spread out.

But for that happened, the people of the Middle East had to move away from the land. In this process many changes occured in the relationship between man and God, some habits had to adapt to new societies, distancing the human of the "proverbs".

The trip to Morocco just influenced Nick Drake to thought about it, I dont think he is talking about islamism - the biggest in Morocco - or other religion. (I want to be clear)

It's about the principle of religion.

"Sand" can be undestanded as lie, the illusions of the world. The misbelief caused by the distance between man and divine teachings.

Clothes of sand covered the mankind face, taking out the senses and making it conceited. The song is about vanity.

To undestands the "conceit", just remember the irony on the need "to paint eyes to see colored skies", or when the speaker questions if the listener would abandon the vanity burning his mundane identity and trying to worship again the wonders of divinity path with "colored lights" and "silver spoons" - which is a direct reference to vanity.

The "shaded glass" line is about the futile attempt to see through something that does not offer sight, just the mirage of "stains of winter's grass" - the hope in the end of affliction, remembering, he was depressed.

I think I covered the whole song and it's fine to undestand. I'm not a religious one and, for aught I know, NIck Drake wasn't too, but I think it is an insight, a beautiful insight, that is not tied to the God and "promisse land" (divinity) interpretation, but is an allusion to the detachment and the addiction in the material and vanity.