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"
I tell you how I feel but you don't care
I say tell me the truth but you don't dare
You say love is a hell you cannot bear
And I say give me mine back and then go there for all I care
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds, you're not at all what you seem
This mind, this body, and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
I have never been so insulted in all my life
I could swallow the seas to wash down all this pride
First you run like a fool just to be at my side
And now you run like a fool but you just run to hide
I can't abide
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds and you're not at all what you seem
This mind this body and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
Don't make it a big deal, don't be so sensitive
We're not playing a game anymore
You don't have to be so defensive
Don't you plead me your case, don't bother to explain
Don't even show me your face 'cause it's a crying shame
Just go back to the rock from under which you came
Take the sorrows you gave and all the stakes you claim
And don't forget to blame
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds and you're not at all what you seem
This mind this body and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds and you're not at all what you seem
This mind this body and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
I say tell me the truth but you don't dare
You say love is a hell you cannot bear
And I say give me mine back and then go there for all I care
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds, you're not at all what you seem
This mind, this body, and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
I have never been so insulted in all my life
I could swallow the seas to wash down all this pride
First you run like a fool just to be at my side
And now you run like a fool but you just run to hide
I can't abide
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds and you're not at all what you seem
This mind this body and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
Don't make it a big deal, don't be so sensitive
We're not playing a game anymore
You don't have to be so defensive
Don't you plead me your case, don't bother to explain
Don't even show me your face 'cause it's a crying shame
Just go back to the rock from under which you came
Take the sorrows you gave and all the stakes you claim
And don't forget to blame
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds and you're not at all what you seem
This mind this body and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
I got my feet on the ground and I don't go to sleep to dream
You got your head in the clouds and you're not at all what you seem
This mind this body and this voice cannot be stifled by your deviant ways
So don't forget what I told you don't come around
I got my own hell to raise
Lyrics submitted by SNYder, edited by Mellow_Harsher
Sleep To Dream Lyrics as written by Fiona Apple Maggart
Lyrics © Peermusic Publishing
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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I always "I don't go to sleep to dream" to mean that she views sleep in the practical sense, not in the idealistic sense. I didn't think it really meant she uses sleep to escape problems. Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought she was just being utilitarian.
Exactly what I thought too