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"
The drunken clown's still hanging round
but it's plain the laughter's all died down
the tears you tried so hard to hide are flowin'
A blind man with his knife in hand
has convinced himself that he understands
I wish him well, Miss Carousel
but I gotta be a-goin'
Won't you come and get me when
you're sure that you don't need me then
I stand outside your window
and proudly call your name
The ladies been told that all of gold
is worth so much it can't be sold
No time to weep she'll need her sleep tomorrow
When she carries her face to the market place
and bets it on the opening race
she can ring her bells, Miss Carousel,
but her singing brings me sorrow
It's always done every mother's son
is shown that grown men never run
and so they fight with all the might inside them
When the battle's been fought and they all been taught
that the trick is just not being caught
Will you give them hell, Miss Carousel,
when they're begging you to hide them
When the need arose your eyes fell closed
you clamped your fingers round your nose
Would you say that's any way to judge him
You haven't got the authority
to kill him in the first degree
but would you feel compelled, Miss Carousel,
if you have something to begrudge him
On a velvet beach far beneath the reach
of those that come to pray and preach
The natural man who tries to stand is fallin
How long will it be before he sees
you own his legs but his mind is free
Only you can tell, Miss Carousel,
how long will he be crawling?
The castle walls has grown so tall
seem there ain't no hope at all
to reach the top even though you stop for breathin'
But I ain't gonna try to make you cry
the tear drops couldn't find your eye
It's all been swell, Miss Carousel,
but the time has come for leavin'
but it's plain the laughter's all died down
the tears you tried so hard to hide are flowin'
A blind man with his knife in hand
has convinced himself that he understands
I wish him well, Miss Carousel
but I gotta be a-goin'
Won't you come and get me when
you're sure that you don't need me then
I stand outside your window
and proudly call your name
The ladies been told that all of gold
is worth so much it can't be sold
No time to weep she'll need her sleep tomorrow
When she carries her face to the market place
and bets it on the opening race
she can ring her bells, Miss Carousel,
but her singing brings me sorrow
It's always done every mother's son
is shown that grown men never run
and so they fight with all the might inside them
When the battle's been fought and they all been taught
that the trick is just not being caught
Will you give them hell, Miss Carousel,
when they're begging you to hide them
When the need arose your eyes fell closed
you clamped your fingers round your nose
Would you say that's any way to judge him
You haven't got the authority
to kill him in the first degree
but would you feel compelled, Miss Carousel,
if you have something to begrudge him
On a velvet beach far beneath the reach
of those that come to pray and preach
The natural man who tries to stand is fallin
How long will it be before he sees
you own his legs but his mind is free
Only you can tell, Miss Carousel,
how long will he be crawling?
The castle walls has grown so tall
seem there ain't no hope at all
to reach the top even though you stop for breathin'
But I ain't gonna try to make you cry
the tear drops couldn't find your eye
It's all been swell, Miss Carousel,
but the time has come for leavin'
Lyrics submitted by afbailey
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Hi there! A beautiful song that deeply touched something inside me. Still, not English (American) born I am afraid I'm not fluent enough to get the meaning of the song. So, please, can anyone explain / give his interpretation of who Miss Carousel is?? Thx a lot!