Too dangerous to keep.
Too feeble to let go.
And you want to bite the hand.
Should have stopped this long ago.

Go now, you've been set free.
Another month or so you'll be gorging on me ("poisoning me" on 2nd and 3rd times)
With your lovely smile.
I see you slither away with your skin and your tail,
Your flickering tongue and your rattling scales
Like a real reptile.

Had you coiled around my arm.
How could you ever know
How I loved your diamond eyes?
But that was long ago. (Chorus)

And I should have believed Eve.
She said we had to blow.
She was the apple of my eye.
It wasn't long ago. (Chorus)


Lyrics submitted by mrtrout

Reptile song meanings
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13 Comments

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  • +2
    General Comment

    This was an amazing song for it's time! truly underrated.

    fatcatx2lon April 14, 2005   Link
  • +1
    General Comment

    Maybe this song's about the Garden of Eden, or how Adam and Eve were kicked out of it:

    • told from Adam's POV = "I should have believed Eve"
    • the reptile refers to the snake that tempted them (didn't the snake lose it's limbs when kicked out of paradise?).

    But maybe the Garden of Eden theory is a metaphor for something else entirely?

    strider3005on June 01, 2006   Link
  • +1
    General Comment

    This song is getting at that same damn thing. 'too dangerous to keep, too feeble to let go' the speaker's relation with that same object of the imagination that stares back at you with 'diamond eyes'. 'you want to bite the hand', the hand that feeds is that alterna subject within but this certain object, feeding it, is robbing this subject of what it wants to do. 'should have stopped this long ago' consolidates this. and yes, if you ask you will be extricated from it, but alas you were too feeble to let go, but it is too dangerous to stay suspended about it indefinitely. and yes, in another month or so you'll come back to gorge on it, which has to do with I it was never you, in the first place.

    hehkateon March 09, 2012   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    i love the guitar in this. just makes me wanna dance!

    Gutteron May 22, 2006   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    The dirty sounding guitar really makes this song, it almost seems out of place in a song like this but works so well.

    I agree with bear hug, it's just a clever way of describing a failed relationship.

    Muzzyon June 22, 2008   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    Wow, what an awesome song! The guitar is excellent. One of the Church's best. Another great but under-rated 80s band

    monster36604on January 12, 2009   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    Could be about smack - "Had you coiled around my arm". Maybe.

    DrLorenzoon May 23, 2009   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    Awesome, thanks for reptile ringtone!<a href="predatorpets.co.uk/">Reptile supplies</a>

    Reptilesupplieson August 10, 2011   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    Adam and Eve and the serpent, slightly reinterpreted by Kilbey. He does stuff like this a lot.

    The authors listed seem to be highly erroneous--those names do not appear in the credits of any version of this record that I own.

    maddpsyintyston May 22, 2014   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    Time for some corrections!

    "too feeble to let go"? wtf? at what point does the narrator describe the other person as "feeble"? It's ridiculous.

    The actual line is "Too dangerous to keep/Too evil to let go".

    Can anyone think of a reptile that can "rattle" their "scales"? NO. THAT'S STUPID.

    The actual line is "I see you slither away with your skin and your scales/your flickering tongue and your rattling tail/like a real reptile"

    Other than that, thanks for posting.

    ogami1972on March 12, 2019   Link

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