This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
So open up your morning light
And say a little prayer for I
You know that if we are to stay alive
And see the peace in every eye
She had two babies
One was six months one was three
In the war of '44
Every telephone ring
Every heartbeat stinging
When she thought it was God calling her
Oh, would her son grow to know his father
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be sorry?
He showed up all wet
On the rainy front step
Wearing shrapnel in his skin
And the war he saw
Lives inside him still
It's so hard to be gentle and warm
The years passed by and now
He has a granddaughter
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be
Oh, so you look at me
From across the room
You're wearing your anguish again
Believe me I know the feeling
It sucks you into the jaws of anger
Oh, so breathe a little more deeply my love
All we have is this very moment
And I don't want to do what
His father and his father and his father did
I want to be here now
So open up your morning light
And say a little prayer for I
You know that if we are to stay alive
And see the peace in every eye
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be sorry?
So open up your morning light
And say a little prayer for I
You know that if we are to stay alive
And see the love in every eye
And say a little prayer for I
You know that if we are to stay alive
And see the peace in every eye
She had two babies
One was six months one was three
In the war of '44
Every telephone ring
Every heartbeat stinging
When she thought it was God calling her
Oh, would her son grow to know his father
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be sorry?
He showed up all wet
On the rainy front step
Wearing shrapnel in his skin
And the war he saw
Lives inside him still
It's so hard to be gentle and warm
The years passed by and now
He has a granddaughter
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be
Oh, so you look at me
From across the room
You're wearing your anguish again
Believe me I know the feeling
It sucks you into the jaws of anger
Oh, so breathe a little more deeply my love
All we have is this very moment
And I don't want to do what
His father and his father and his father did
I want to be here now
So open up your morning light
And say a little prayer for I
You know that if we are to stay alive
And see the peace in every eye
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
I want to know right now
What will it be
I don't want to wait
For our lives to be over
Will it be yes or will it be sorry?
So open up your morning light
And say a little prayer for I
You know that if we are to stay alive
And see the love in every eye
Lyrics submitted by me109cito, edited by incendiary
I Don't Want to Wait Lyrics as written by Paula Cole
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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this is sad that everyone associates this song with dawnson's creek now. nice commentary so far too -- i can see real deeping thinking what with all the "DAWSON'S CREEKS" and "PACEY IS SOO HAWT".
anyway back to the song. pretty straightforward song about the effects of war and what it does to you. i see it as one of the descendants of this family looking back on how her ancestors' love was spoiled by war -- he left his wife to raise their daughters all alone, and when he came back he was a jaded bitter man who didn't offer the family any love, hence "it's so hard to be gentle and warm". so this descendent is looking back on all this and telling her significant other "let's not be like this, lets not let how our fathers lived affect our lives."
You know it could have easily been how mothers lived that could ruin peoples lives also; we should be a gender equal society these days, Just like you have seen now women going to war , women bread winners at their jobs... etc etc. And Fathers are treated like illegal immigrants in family courts still; very sad they keep them from their children and make them pay like dogs;; that is not right and its time for a change.. Just a thought .