There Is a Light That Never Goes Out

Wow Sarah754. If that wasn't a joke then I really pity your ignorance on many levels!

Anyway,

These lines are unbelievable:

"and in the darkened underpass I thought Oh God, my chance has come at last but then a strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask"

This is understatement on such a grand scale that it would stand up to any poetry ever written (in my opinion). A strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask. The literal meaning is almost inconsequential, but the sorrow, anguish and regret so clear behind these words make the hair on my arms stand up whenever I hear this song. And I hear it pretty often. Sublime.

Irvine Welsh's "Trainspotting" has a chapter with the same title as this song, and I think sums up its meaning perfectly. If you are a Smiths fan please read it.

TO me, the light that never goes out is something between hope, excitement and the thrill of what just might happen, and that ANYthing could happen. The feeling that is so sadly extinguished in many by adult years, and replaced by cynicism and the idea that "If you expect nothing then you will never be disappointed". The song is a celebration of chasing unlikely dreams of any form, the butterflies in your stomach, the anticipation of the unknown, of life being lived to its fullest, without the mind ever capturing how that might be, the thrill of opening your mind and heart to the most extreme emotions you can imagine without the fear of what harm may come of it. The exuberance and fearlessness of youth.

The Smiths were truly unique. Sometimes I go a few months without listening to a Smiths song, then I hear one on the radio and fall in love with them all over again, spending days listening to nothing else.

And I still dream of meeting someone who merits the words and emotions expressed in Morrissey's lyrics. I am not going to speculate on who his muse was, but to me this person has assumed transcendental properties of purity and beauty. While I could think of an old flame fondly or bitterly listening to many musicians, the Smiths speak of something so much higher that I could never apply them to any person I have ever met.

Waffle over. Big Love