Teeth

I see this as a landscape with an ocean.

Oceans and water are commonly referred to as archetypes or symbols about deep emotion and the subconscious - the territory both love and pain. I feel like this is kind of what Lisa is referring to here - that she is talking about a deep relationship she had with someone where she "dove in" with him, and truly loved him. I think it was deep and passionate because they were both strong individuals at the start, she had her "teeth bared" and was strong and virile and able to give of herself and expected the same in return. That was what made it worth "diving in", so to speak.

But the beginning of the song opens up with a quiet, delicate reverie-like piano. It sounds like she is wistfully reflecting on something she has realized - she has "surfaced from the water", so to speak, and is sadly experiencing a kind of revelation on her own. There's something in her heart that she should say, but it's heavy, she doesn't have the energy anymore to wade through the depths, to offer herself and what's in her heart up to him anymore. She's mentally and emotionally drained, cold from being submerged in the depths for so long and the "bends in his brain and his elaborate pain", they keep pulling her under and beneath the surface.

"Like an old balloon I hold my breath, like a penance paid too soon with too much eagerness to know what is true."

What's true used to be able to sustain them, keep them swimming. There was something real and tangible between them. But in their relationship now, she's prematurely forced to age, to carry all of the weight for both of them on her own shoulders. She's forced and sort of manipulated, in order for their relationship to work (to know what is true) by his changing moods and sort of dictatorial way of being. It sounds like he is kind of self-centred in his own pain, and leaves her to man the ship, to carry the weight of his "elaborate pain" and navigate the way for both of them. His expectation of her to do this kind of leaves her hanging and holding her breath, and makes it seem natural - because they do have a real love - so she's left eager waiting to know the truth from him, but he keeps changing in a fickle way, seemingly immune to her pain and love.

"I don't know where it comes from"

I agree with the other readers that it sounds like her partner is kind of consumed in a depression, or something heavy and dark that sweeps him away from her - a kind of torrential current in this "ocean" that pulls him away from her, and she "doesn't know where it comes from". Basically it sounds like this "depression" or whatever you would like to call it is some new, foreign introduction into their love that consumes him and pulls him deep into himself and away from her, such that she loves him still but is suddenly left lost and confused, "holding her breath" once the air is changed, waiting for him to come back. This pain or depression is like this monster under the bed that keeps coming out and frightening her and upsetting her world.

She's hurt and lost, bewildered about why he has suddenly gone and left her, what this dark, heavy thing is - "the rains come".

"pour me back in the bottle where the sea meets the sun"

I think of this as a sort of ship in a bottle. This is where I see the archetype of the ocean most clearly - I see her as wanting to "jump ship" - to get back out of the depths of his emotion she bought into to have a relationship and is now mired in and drowning in. I see the sky as a sort of lightness and freedom, and she wants to "jump ship" and go back into herself, in a "ship in a bottle" floating between the ocean and the sky where she can continue to see the world on her own terms. Where she's no longer being pulled under by his darkness and "rains", but is back on her own, where there is none of this elaborate pain or darkness - "where the bones and their rattle don't mean anything to noone". Where she doesn't have to deal with this unfair imposition of all of his burdens on her shoulders, this "penance paid too soon with too much eagerness" - she loves him, but is realizing she needs to pull herself out of the depths if she doesn't want to drown. She doesn't need to sign up for the rains. She wants to go somewhere else when the rains come, where "the bones and their rattle don't mean anything to no one."

"I had a swing when my salt was my own."

I just picture this as a follow up to the last verse - she was free and liberated when it was only her, when the only pain she had to deal with was her own - the salt being either her tears or the "ocean" of her own depth and pain. She never needed or deserved to have all of his weight and pain placed on her shoulders. She had her teeth bared for battle and was strong and powerful on her own, robust, and signed up for this thinking she and him could conquer things together as two strong, equal people, but she is being pulled under and consumed in this undercurrent by his darkness or "the rains", they come in a torrential downpour and weaken her and drown her.

"Put me back in the bottle"

The buildup to this, I picture her being tussled around underwater by this unexpected current, struggling against it and then almost futilely giving into the tides, being consumed by this "rain" and her own pain now, almost giving into it and just singing out with the emotion of it. Saying how it made her dull, knowing now that this is what the love was, sort of explaining wistfully again how she was tricked and misled and weakened. And it ends on that same wistful, reflective note.

I find this song really beautiful.