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"
He's a father, a man
He's a husband with stories he tells
Of days that he lived through
And things that he watched die as well
He said "I've fought wars and I've had my day
I was forced to be strong
I was taught to be brave and I was
I saw things that weren't meant to be seen
I would have lost it all for my
Country and queen but I'm here
I took the hand of a mixed race girl
And she showed me to love
Yeah she showed me the world now I'm dying"
But I can't die no I can't die
Until I've lived my life
She's a mother, a woman
A grandma with secrets she kept
And some of those secrets were the
Only thing she had left
She said "I saw women in magazines
Who I could have known, who
I could have been, yeah that's right
Cast my hands in those concrete slabs
I just wanted to sing
I just wanted to dance every night
And I had visions and I had dreams
But they weren't the same as my
Husband and children at home
And I made choices that weren't alright
And I lived my life being someone's wife
Don't I know?"
But I can't die no I can't die
I hope there are smiles in the crowd
When I'm lowered into the ground
And the earth, takes me back
And they'll say I did all I can
And I'll sleep with no dreams in my mind
'Cause my dreams were so very alive
But this time no I can't die
Until I've lived my life
No, I can't die no, I can't die
Until I've lived my life
He's a husband with stories he tells
Of days that he lived through
And things that he watched die as well
He said "I've fought wars and I've had my day
I was forced to be strong
I was taught to be brave and I was
I saw things that weren't meant to be seen
I would have lost it all for my
Country and queen but I'm here
I took the hand of a mixed race girl
And she showed me to love
Yeah she showed me the world now I'm dying"
But I can't die no I can't die
Until I've lived my life
She's a mother, a woman
A grandma with secrets she kept
And some of those secrets were the
Only thing she had left
She said "I saw women in magazines
Who I could have known, who
I could have been, yeah that's right
Cast my hands in those concrete slabs
I just wanted to sing
I just wanted to dance every night
And I had visions and I had dreams
But they weren't the same as my
Husband and children at home
And I made choices that weren't alright
And I lived my life being someone's wife
Don't I know?"
But I can't die no I can't die
I hope there are smiles in the crowd
When I'm lowered into the ground
And the earth, takes me back
And they'll say I did all I can
And I'll sleep with no dreams in my mind
'Cause my dreams were so very alive
But this time no I can't die
Until I've lived my life
No, I can't die no, I can't die
Until I've lived my life
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