In regards to the meaning of this song:
Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
That’s the thing about Geoff and his sublime poetry, you think it’s about one thing, but really it’s about something entirely different. But the lyrics are still universal and omnipresent, ubiquitous, even. So relatable. That’s one thing I love about this band. I also love their live performances, raw energy and Geoff’s beautiful, imperfectly perfect vocals. His voice soothes my aching soul.
Did the wine make her dream
Of the far distant spring
Or a bed full of hens
Or the ghost of a friend
All the while that she wept
She had a gun by her bed
And a letter he wrote
From a dry, foundered boat
And the train track will take
All the wounded ones home
And I'll be alone
Fare thee well Sara Jones
Now we lie on the floor
While the radio war
Finds its way through the air
Of the dead market square
And the beast never seen
Licks I's red talons clean
Sara curses the cold
"No more snow, no more snow"
Of the far distant spring
Or a bed full of hens
Or the ghost of a friend
All the while that she wept
She had a gun by her bed
And a letter he wrote
From a dry, foundered boat
And the train track will take
All the wounded ones home
And I'll be alone
Fare thee well Sara Jones
Now we lie on the floor
While the radio war
Finds its way through the air
Of the dead market square
And the beast never seen
Licks I's red talons clean
Sara curses the cold
"No more snow, no more snow"
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This is one of my favorite songs. https://fnfgo.io
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Page
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There aren’t many things that’ll hurt more than giving love a chance against your better judgement only to have your heart crushed yet again. Ed Sheeran tells such a story on “Page.” On this track, he is devastated to have lost his lover and even more saddened by the feeling that he may never move on from this.
I really like this song. I think its about a girl who's husband died at war. Its winter time and she just wants the season to pass. The war overseas is just the "radio war" but for Sara it means a lot more because she lost a loved one. I like how the war is personified as a "beast" with "red talons".
I concur. This is my favorite song by Iron and Wine. I was surprised when I found that nobody had posted the lyrics. The only problem with this song is that it's too short.
"All the while that she wept She'd a gun by her bed And the letter he wrote From a dry, foundered boat."
I like that verse. It seems she was considering suicide. It also mentioned her drinking wine in the first verse and making her dream of things. So she was trying to drink her problems away, I guess. It's a very sad song. But beautifully constructed.
this could almost be my favorite song on this album, which was one of my 2 or 3 favorite albums of 2004. it's so sparse, but the lyrics are so spot on. the 2nd, 4th and 5th verses make chills run down my spine. i love the line, especially since it's so cold here right now, "sara curses the cold; 'no more snow, no more snow'"
I think that this song is about two lovers, one of them sent off to war (World War I). She has gotten drunk and is contemplating suicide while reading the last letter from her lover who has been killed. The radio war is the reports of the war coming across the radio (pre-TV). The "beast never seen" is War itself and the reference to snow may be the season in which her lover died.
this is a really sad song now that i read the lyrics...i still really like it though.
Fucking amazing lyrics
Beautiful, delicate, and great lyrics
i love this song. it expresses the frustration of being alone in a way only sam beam can. it develops from lofty images of a dream to the beast of war and ends on the same personal level on which it began. so delicate.
pay attention to the subjects and where they are. he speaks of she, he, i, sara jones, and we. SHE (possibly sara jones) is weeping in her room. HE wrote a letter from a foundered boat. I will be alone once the train track takes the soldiers home. and WE lie on the floor. there are at least 3 characters in this story. something to think about...
I guess the "I" refers to "he" <br /> Here quotes a few lines from his letter to her<br /> and the following "we" refers to "he" and his soldier comrades<br /> thus there're altogether two characters in this song<br /> <br /> the shift of the subject is always confusing...
I'd have to disagree with neonskyline about WWI. WWI was primarily pre-radio, even for the United States. Plus, the mention of a "boat" brings to mind submarines, which were also WWII exclusive.
And as for the rest of the song, I always imagined it as a girl in a little German town, mourning over a lover lost to the U.S. in the destruction of a U-boat, and the "red" would have been the occupying Communists.
Sevilen is wrong on "the beast never seen." He calls it "the beast never seen" because it is unknown, it has no identity, it either is rarely acknowledged or not acknowledged at all. Communist Soviets are established, acknowledged and have an identity therefore cannot fit the label of something "never seen." I believe that Sam is trying to make the point that people rarely see certain elements of war. This particular element being the effects on the family of a soldier, and what the death of a soldier causes/can cause outside of the obvious sad fact that the soldier died. This beast still lives and presides in the middle east and is as active as ever. And the human race will never rid themself of this beast, some of us have tried but Islamic Fascist's insist on keeping it alive.