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"
Come, hold me now, I am not gone
I would not leave you here alone
In this dead calm beneath the waves
I can still hear those lost boys calling
You could not speak, you were afraid
To take the risk of being left again
And so you tipped your hat and waved and then
You turned back up the gangway of that steel tomb again
And in Mott street in July
When I hear those seabirds cry
I hold the child, the child in the man
The child that we leave behind
And in Mott street in July
When I hear those seabirds cry
I hold the child, the child in the man
The child that we leave behind
The spotlight fades, the boys disband
The final notes lie mute upon the sand
And in the silence of the grave
I can still hear those lost boys calling
We left them there when they were young
The men were gone until the west was won
And now there's nothing left but time to kill
You never took us fishin' dad and now you never will
And in Mott street in July
When I hear those seabirds cry
I hold the child, the child in the man
The child that we leave behind
I would not leave you here alone
In this dead calm beneath the waves
I can still hear those lost boys calling
You could not speak, you were afraid
To take the risk of being left again
And so you tipped your hat and waved and then
You turned back up the gangway of that steel tomb again
And in Mott street in July
When I hear those seabirds cry
I hold the child, the child in the man
The child that we leave behind
And in Mott street in July
When I hear those seabirds cry
I hold the child, the child in the man
The child that we leave behind
The spotlight fades, the boys disband
The final notes lie mute upon the sand
And in the silence of the grave
I can still hear those lost boys calling
We left them there when they were young
The men were gone until the west was won
And now there's nothing left but time to kill
You never took us fishin' dad and now you never will
And in Mott street in July
When I hear those seabirds cry
I hold the child, the child in the man
The child that we leave behind
Lyrics submitted by PolesApart76
Lost Boys Calling Lyrics as written by Roger Waters Ennio Morricone
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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Man, can Waters pen a lyric! Just reading them, knowing full well how achingly beautiful the melody he sings over it, gives me chills. I think this song speaks broadly about the passage of time and who, over time, we need to leave behind, be that a military person, a cherished friend, or close family. There's also something about Mott Street, which is in Little Italy in New York City. I think the lyrics are reflecting the struggle of the immigrant at the turn of the 20th century. Leave it to Roger to be able to write a lyric that captures something specific inside of something so broad. He's been doing it for decades.