| Iron & Wine – The Trapeze Swinger Lyrics | 4 years ago |
| This song is about the desire for forgiveness — for grace — for the impossible situation of humanity: unable to stay in a state where we are fully conscious and loving to those around us, so often "swinging" into a place where we are "mistaken," or acting from own ego, and hurt them. \n\nBiblical metaphors figure heavily, as do those of viewing, heights, and vantage points: being able to truly "see" is to love, where the god or savior holds the highest vantage point above the "monkey" and "man" to which he respectively compares himself and the former love who loved so much better than he did. In the most obvious set of metaphors, it is only appropriate that clowns look on and marching bands go by as man\'s attempts at reaching the divine are a circus. Our trapeze artist unites all three, swinging over misery to occasionally heavenly views in a thrilling act.\n\nAs the narrator looks back on the course of his relationship and judges himself, the gates of heaven provide the perfect metaphorical backdrop. We chart the relationship from their youthful innocence ("rug-burned babies") lying together at the same level in an almost Eden-like setting, as he slips into trickery (Halloween), forgets his love, and, like Adam after the Fall, awakens "ashamed." Later, the circus parking lot devolves into a slightly hell-like setting after his anger when she rejects the temporary ("never meant to last") earthly pleasures he pursues between her knees.\n\nNow, he wishes he had been able to offer the girl the perfect, divine love she aims to emulate, but ultimately he is as human as the graffiti artists railing at the impossible expectations placed on them ("Who the Hell can see forever?"). \n\nBy the final stanza, he perhaps finds grace for his humanity, imagining his love "an angel kissing on a sinner" as the hierarchies of monkey, man, god and Lucifer all collide in his imagined drawing accompanied by the marching music that accompanies the upward climbing to a goal never quite reachable. A merry little tune begins to play suggesting there is beauty in the climb. | |
| The Thermals – St. Rosa and the Swallows Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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"The miracle of the 'Swallows' of Capistrano takes place each year at the Mission San Juan Capistano, on March 19th, St. Joseph's Day. As the little birds wing their way back to the most famous Mission in California, the village of San Juan Capistrano takes on a fiesta air and the visitors from all parts of the world, and all walks of life, gather in great numbers to witness the 'miracle' of the return of the swallows. " http://www.capovalley.com/swallows/ So... |
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