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"
Pave these streets with open arms
It's always you we're waiting on
The skin, the taste, the drug, the need
I'm asking, telling you, don't leave
Erase the lines that we have drawn
It's always you we're waiting on
And waiting on and waiting on
And on and on and on and on
These are our words, we built these vows
But all the letters of the alphabet could never spell it out
These hopes and dreams that we tap through
To cling to something that is bigger than the veil that tips at you
Wait wait wait, I don't want to see
Wait wait wait, I am not the person anyone would want to be
The perfect shoes with matching clothes
It is the lie we're always told
And nothing masks the shallow touch
By saying words that cost so much
While you're an addict to the need
To find yourself a way to breathe
The sex, the purge, the pain, the book
To reflex feelings that we took
These are our words, we built these vows
But all the letters of the alphabet could never spell it out
These hopes and dreams that we tap through
To cling to something that is bigger than the veil that tips at you
Perfection, it's perfection
But never quiet enough, and never could disguise
The truths to make it stain the wanting in your eyes
The morning that you've spent, but you're still an accident
We are more than words that fill our mouths
Drink with us then tell us the answers that we need
These are our words, we built these vows
But all the letters of the alphabet could never spell it out
These hopes and dreams that we tap through
To cling to something that is bigger than the veil that tips at you
Wait wait wait, I don't want to see
Wait wait wait, I am not the person anyone would want to be
Waiting here til you leave
It's always you we're waiting on
The skin, the taste, the drug, the need
I'm asking, telling you, don't leave
Erase the lines that we have drawn
It's always you we're waiting on
And waiting on and waiting on
And on and on and on and on
These are our words, we built these vows
But all the letters of the alphabet could never spell it out
These hopes and dreams that we tap through
To cling to something that is bigger than the veil that tips at you
Wait wait wait, I don't want to see
Wait wait wait, I am not the person anyone would want to be
The perfect shoes with matching clothes
It is the lie we're always told
And nothing masks the shallow touch
By saying words that cost so much
While you're an addict to the need
To find yourself a way to breathe
The sex, the purge, the pain, the book
To reflex feelings that we took
These are our words, we built these vows
But all the letters of the alphabet could never spell it out
These hopes and dreams that we tap through
To cling to something that is bigger than the veil that tips at you
Perfection, it's perfection
But never quiet enough, and never could disguise
The truths to make it stain the wanting in your eyes
The morning that you've spent, but you're still an accident
We are more than words that fill our mouths
Drink with us then tell us the answers that we need
These are our words, we built these vows
But all the letters of the alphabet could never spell it out
These hopes and dreams that we tap through
To cling to something that is bigger than the veil that tips at you
Wait wait wait, I don't want to see
Wait wait wait, I am not the person anyone would want to be
Waiting here til you leave
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This song is tight. I think it's about how people put on masks and hide who we really are, and what we do (drugs, smoking, drinking, etc.) from people such as our parents or teachers or whomever we're hiding from. We don't want to them to see us in that state. We try to look 'perfect' as if nothing's wrong with us, but our insides desire it too much to hide.