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"
Yo what's up everybody? This is Maria Davis, Mad Wednesdays
We here tonight to have a good time
("Yo! Start the show! Start the show!")
Wait a minute, I see my man over there, Jay-Z
Jay-Z, Dame Dash let me hear that lil' tape of yours, and it's fat
Why don't you come up here and kick a lil' freestyle
Put that champagne down, and kick a lil' freestyle for me tonight
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Y'all motherfuckers musta heard that Tribe Called Quest, let's do it again
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Well I'm gone, check this out
Too much West coast dick-lickin'
And too many niggas on a mission
Doin' your best Jay-Z rendition
Too many rough motherfuckers, I got my suspicions
That you're just fish in a pool of sharks, nigga
Listen, too many bitches wanna be ladies
So if you a hoe, I'ma call you a hoe
Too many bitches are shady
Too many ladies give these niggas too many chances
Too many brothers wanna be lovers, don't know what romance is
Too many bitches stuck up from too many sexual advances
No question, Jay-Z got too many answers
I been around this block too many times
Rocked too many rhymes, cocked too many nines too
To all my brothers, it ain't too late to come together
'Cause too much black and too much love equal forever
I don't follow any guidelines 'cause too many niggas ride mine
So I change styles every two rhymes (ha, what the fuck?)
That's twenty two too's for y'all motherfuckers out there, you know what I mean?
Shall I continue? Check it out, what?
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Well I'm gone, yo, yo, yo
Copped to reach my quota
Push rock, roll up smooth like on ya
Whole groove like hold-up, swol' up
Too many faggot niggas clockin' my spendin'
Exercisin' your gay-like minds like Richard Simmons
If you could catch Jay right, on the late night
Without the eight, right, maybe you could test my weight, right
I dip, spit quicker than you ever seen
Administer pain, next the minister's screamin' your name
At your wake as I peak in, look in your casket
Feelin' sarcastic, "Look at him, still sleepin'"
You're never ready, forever petty minds stay petty
Mine's thinkin' longevity until I'm seventy
Livin' heavenly, fuck, felony after felony, what?
Nigga you're broke, what the fuck you gon' tell me? (Oh)
Jay-Z, Jay-Z
Now you know this is a fat track (aight)
Now this is comin' on your new album, on Roc-A-Fella records in '96? (no doubt, no doubt)
Well, it is definitely the bomb
But you know I do wanna say somethin' to you, I know
You've been havin' a lot of problems with the law
But I know you innocent, and I'm behind you 100%
Mad Wednesdays, Rudy King, DJ Ace, Dame Dash, Roc-A-Fella Records
We're all behind you, you can come back anytime (Hah, thanks a lot)
Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute
Ace, turn that music down
I smell some reefer, now you see?
That's why, our people don't have anything
Because we don't know how to go in places and act properly ("Hey shut the fuck up!")
Wait a minute, wait a minute, who told me shut the F up?
Who told me to shut the F up? Get him out of here
I'm not gonna continue this show, until you throw him out
Get him out right now, then I'ma continue my speech
Thank you, he's out of here now, now like I was sayin'
We gotta build our own businesses
We gotta get our own record companies goin like Roc-A-Fella Records
We gotta put money back into our own community
We here tonight to have a good time
("Yo! Start the show! Start the show!")
Wait a minute, I see my man over there, Jay-Z
Jay-Z, Dame Dash let me hear that lil' tape of yours, and it's fat
Why don't you come up here and kick a lil' freestyle
Put that champagne down, and kick a lil' freestyle for me tonight
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Y'all motherfuckers musta heard that Tribe Called Quest, let's do it again
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Well I'm gone, check this out
Too much West coast dick-lickin'
And too many niggas on a mission
Doin' your best Jay-Z rendition
Too many rough motherfuckers, I got my suspicions
That you're just fish in a pool of sharks, nigga
Listen, too many bitches wanna be ladies
So if you a hoe, I'ma call you a hoe
Too many bitches are shady
Too many ladies give these niggas too many chances
Too many brothers wanna be lovers, don't know what romance is
Too many bitches stuck up from too many sexual advances
No question, Jay-Z got too many answers
I been around this block too many times
Rocked too many rhymes, cocked too many nines too
To all my brothers, it ain't too late to come together
'Cause too much black and too much love equal forever
I don't follow any guidelines 'cause too many niggas ride mine
So I change styles every two rhymes (ha, what the fuck?)
That's twenty two too's for y'all motherfuckers out there, you know what I mean?
Shall I continue? Check it out, what?
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Can I kick it? (Yes you can)
Well I'm gone, yo, yo, yo
Copped to reach my quota
Push rock, roll up smooth like on ya
Whole groove like hold-up, swol' up
Too many faggot niggas clockin' my spendin'
Exercisin' your gay-like minds like Richard Simmons
If you could catch Jay right, on the late night
Without the eight, right, maybe you could test my weight, right
I dip, spit quicker than you ever seen
Administer pain, next the minister's screamin' your name
At your wake as I peak in, look in your casket
Feelin' sarcastic, "Look at him, still sleepin'"
You're never ready, forever petty minds stay petty
Mine's thinkin' longevity until I'm seventy
Livin' heavenly, fuck, felony after felony, what?
Nigga you're broke, what the fuck you gon' tell me? (Oh)
Jay-Z, Jay-Z
Now you know this is a fat track (aight)
Now this is comin' on your new album, on Roc-A-Fella records in '96? (no doubt, no doubt)
Well, it is definitely the bomb
But you know I do wanna say somethin' to you, I know
You've been havin' a lot of problems with the law
But I know you innocent, and I'm behind you 100%
Mad Wednesdays, Rudy King, DJ Ace, Dame Dash, Roc-A-Fella Records
We're all behind you, you can come back anytime (Hah, thanks a lot)
Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute
Ace, turn that music down
I smell some reefer, now you see?
That's why, our people don't have anything
Because we don't know how to go in places and act properly ("Hey shut the fuck up!")
Wait a minute, wait a minute, who told me shut the F up?
Who told me to shut the F up? Get him out of here
I'm not gonna continue this show, until you throw him out
Get him out right now, then I'ma continue my speech
Thank you, he's out of here now, now like I was sayin'
We gotta build our own businesses
We gotta get our own record companies goin like Roc-A-Fella Records
We gotta put money back into our own community
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Great version of a great song,
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chorus taken from Can I Kick It? by A Tribe Called Quest
he says that in the song...