| Crystal Castles – Transgender Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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Keeping the title in mind, I think this song might be about the suffering transgender people go through with their bodies while growing up. "Will you ever preserve, will you ever exhume?" Preserve could refer to the body before puberty. When gaining secondary sex characteristics, a body tends to become more masculine/feminine. If this process is paused (with the use of hormone blockers) transitioning becomes much easier. So here they could be referring to the body before being changed by puberty. How long could they hold on to the body before it starts maturing? Could they ever preserve that? Would the people around them let them? To exhume means to dig up, this could refer to their identity. Will a child realize that they're transgender? (possibly before puberty) A lot of children do acknowledge that they don't feel like the gender they were assigned, but a lot of them don't realize that it may be an actual thing, instead of something weird that they only go through. Parents try to tell their child that what they're feeling is wrong, just a phase and something they should forget about. Only much later do a lot of people find out that it's an actual thing and that they're not crazy. "Will you watch petals shed from flowers in bloom?" I think they're referring to the changes the body goes through. Falling petals could suggest that the flower is falling apart. This could refer to the person that is feeling discomfort with their body. That they're 'falling apart' because of their discomfort with their body. The fact that it feels wrong. 'Blooming' would then refer to puberty. Will you be able to go through that discomfort? Will they be able to witness those changes? Will they be able to go through those changes? A flower that is blooming and shedding petals at the same time; Someone that is growing up, but falling apart at the same time. "Nothing can live up to promise. Nothing can stop it's narrative" Even if you promise yourself that you will change your body, the fact remains that you'll always be transgender. You always will pretty much have those chromosomes and your body will always be that of a certain sex. You can't say that one day you'll be exactly like the opposite gender biologically. (at least in this day and age) It's a grim realization. A very grim one which I imagine a lot of transgender people stuggle with. Narrative could refer to the narrative of your body, of nature. Your body was programmed to be a certain sex and you could of course use hormones and surgery and whatnot, but as I said; you're still transgender. Nothing can stop that. Your chromosomes can't just change from XX to XY and vice-versa. and at the end of the day your body itself would just want to continue being that biological gender, not caring if you like it or not. Another really grim realization. "Nothing in place of catalysts. And you'll never be pure again" By catalysts they could be talking about hormone blockers again. If you don't have those, your body will just go through puberty normally, making transitioning harder (not impossible though, mind you). Catalysts being 'helpers' in chemical reactions and hormone blockers being 'helpers' when it comes to transitioning. By being 'pure' they could be referring to the body before puberty, before becoming overly masculine/feminine, before the discomfort because of puberty. After puberty, they won't have that anymore, not without something like hormone blockers. I noticed the other comments talking about how this song refers to life and death and perhaps it's applicable here too. Transgender people can feel trapped inside of their body, some can become depressed, maybe even suicidal. Not just because of their body, but because of how society treats these people. Life and nature won't stop still and change it's routine. Everything will just go on. It's up to them to make changes and to accept who they are. Can they face it, though? How life cruelly goes on untill it's withered away? How we're all so powerless when it comes to these things, How we just have to deal with it? and on top of that, the fact that society hasn't accepted these people yet? This is a very grim song overall. |
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