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The Wild Wild Sea Lyrics
I saw it again this evening,
Black sail in a pale yellow sky
And just as before in a moment,
It was gone where the grey gulls fly
If it happens again I shall worry
That only a strange ship could fly
And my sanity scans the horizon
In the light of the darkening sky.
That night, as I walked in my slumber
I waded into the sea strand
And I swam with the moon and her lover
Until I lost sight of the land
I swam till the night became morning
Black sail in a reddening sky
Found myself on the deck of a rolling ship
So far where no grey gulls fly
All around me was silence
As if mocking my frail human hopes
And a question mark hung in the canvas
For the wind that had died in the ropes
I may have slept for an hour
I may have slept for a day
For I woke in a bed of white linen
And the sky was the colour of clay.
At first, just a rustle of canvas
And the gentlest breath on my face
But a galloping line of white horses
Said that soon we were in for a race
And the gentle sigh turned to a howling
And the grey sky, she angered to black
And my anxious eyes searched the horizon
With the gathering sea at my back
Did I see the shade of a sailor
On the bridge, through the wheel-house pane
Held fast to the wheel of the rocking ship
As I squinted my eyes in the rain?
For the ship had turned into the wind
Against the storm to brace
And underneath the sailor's hat
I saw my father's face
If a prayer today is spoken
Please offer it for me
When the bridge to heaven is broken
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
Black sail in a pale yellow sky
And just as before in a moment,
It was gone where the grey gulls fly
If it happens again I shall worry
That only a strange ship could fly
And my sanity scans the horizon
In the light of the darkening sky.
I waded into the sea strand
And I swam with the moon and her lover
Until I lost sight of the land
I swam till the night became morning
Black sail in a reddening sky
Found myself on the deck of a rolling ship
So far where no grey gulls fly
All around me was silence
As if mocking my frail human hopes
And a question mark hung in the canvas
I may have slept for an hour
I may have slept for a day
For I woke in a bed of white linen
And the sky was the colour of clay.
And the gentlest breath on my face
But a galloping line of white horses
Said that soon we were in for a race
And the gentle sigh turned to a howling
And the grey sky, she angered to black
And my anxious eyes searched the horizon
With the gathering sea at my back
On the bridge, through the wheel-house pane
Held fast to the wheel of the rocking ship
As I squinted my eyes in the rain?
For the ship had turned into the wind
Against the storm to brace
And underneath the sailor's hat
I saw my father's face
Please offer it for me
When the bridge to heaven is broken
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
And you're lost on the wild, wild sea
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[Sting]: It's important for me to come to terms with my father, to meditate on what he was and what he did, and occasionally I do find myself idealizing him - but I think that's constructive. In a way I'm trying to mythologize my relationship with him because I have no other way of dealing with it, no other path. He appears in one of the songs, 'The Wild Wild Sea', as a sort of hero figure - he's the sailor who turns the ship around. I needed to see my father as a hero - every son needs that.
In this story, the man sees a ghost ship flying. In his dream or while sleepwalking, he poetically swims until he finds himself on a ship. I think the galloping line of white horses refers to a cloud formation but I’m not too up on my cumulonimbus facts. A storm cuts in, he sees a sailor in the rain and it looks like his father.
Since this song is from Soul Cages—an album dedicated to his father’s death, “when the bridge to heaven is broken” refers to his father’s death. Being lost on the wild wild sea refers to feelings of loss when someone we love dies. He may have had a dream about his father after the death—which wouldn’t be unusual.
A strange foreboding is over me My heart is idly fraught I have heard an eerie story That I cannot clear from thought
There sits and gleams a maiden Yonder so high and fair With sparking jewels laden Tossing her golden hair
She speaks with tongue so golden And ever singing is she A song mysteriously olden A mighty melody
It seizes with wildest sorrow The sailor sailing by And he recks not of rock or of narrow And he gazes like he was high
I doubt not the wave will devour The ship and the sailor ere long And that was the lorelei’s power And that was the lorelei’s song
Heinrich Heine (paraphrased)
I think this song might be about the scary places our mind and our lives can take us if we dare to go out past the known. Sometimes we get lost at sea. Out in the world looking for truth, meaning.... only to find emptiness, nothing. In this case, Sting trying to find meaning in his father's death.
"The bridge to heaven is broken". Sting is describing the area between earth and the afterlife. His father's soul helps him get back to the living. You go after the dead, clinging to them. We get no answers to our human questions.
Much anxiety and frustration, We are lost on the wild, wild sea. No one answers us as if those who could only mock us. "as if mocking my frail human hopes."
Our fathers, our guardian angels if they exist, are always there to bring us back. He has to face the storm again to get back to land. His father is steering the ship.
If a prayer today, the day my father died, is offered please offer it to me, not my father. I'm the one lost on the sea, he's bringing me back. I'm the one stuck between two worlds.