"It's so beautiful here," she says,
"This moment now and this moment, now."
And I never thought I would find her here:
Flannel and satin, my four walls transformed.
But she's looking at me, straight to center,
No room at all for any other thought.
And I know I don't want this, oh, I swear I don't want this.
There's a reason not to want this but I forgot.
In the terminal she sleeps on my shoulder,
Hair falling forward, mouth all askew.
Fluorescent announcements beat their wings overhead:
"Passengers missing, we're looking for you."
And she dreams through the noise, her weight against me,
Face pressed into the corduroy grooves.
Maybe it means nothing, maybe it means nothing,
Maybe it means nothing, but I'm afraid to move.
And the words: they're everything and nothing.
I want to search for her in the offhand remarks.
Who are you, taking coffee, no sugar?
Who are you, echoing street signs?
Who are you, the stranger in the shell of a lover,
Dark curtains drawn by the passage of time?
Oh, words, like rain, how sweet the sound.
"Well anyway," she says, "I'll see you around..."
"This moment now and this moment, now."
And I never thought I would find her here:
Flannel and satin, my four walls transformed.
But she's looking at me, straight to center,
No room at all for any other thought.
And I know I don't want this, oh, I swear I don't want this.
There's a reason not to want this but I forgot.
In the terminal she sleeps on my shoulder,
Hair falling forward, mouth all askew.
Fluorescent announcements beat their wings overhead:
"Passengers missing, we're looking for you."
And she dreams through the noise, her weight against me,
Face pressed into the corduroy grooves.
Maybe it means nothing, maybe it means nothing,
Maybe it means nothing, but I'm afraid to move.
And the words: they're everything and nothing.
I want to search for her in the offhand remarks.
Who are you, taking coffee, no sugar?
Who are you, echoing street signs?
Who are you, the stranger in the shell of a lover,
Dark curtains drawn by the passage of time?
Oh, words, like rain, how sweet the sound.
"Well anyway," she says, "I'll see you around..."
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So you can get frustrated with the casualness of the situation, or you can convince yourself of deeper meaning in everything that they do.
and what's really better?
She's met an ex-lover by accident somewhere. They've chatted, and the speaker has searched their soul for the person they knew and remember still. But this person is not that - they are a stranger, shrouded by time apart. They're a different person.
And then parting again as quick as it came - see you around. A beautiful moment, so many thoughts and emotions, and then it was over.
One of my favorite songs of all time. What raw emotion and perfect expression of this event. Beautiful.
Disregarding the "love story in reverse" bit. I honestly thought of this as two people, meeting in an airport. Sitting together, one falling asleep on the other, one of them (possibly both of them) and then the other leaving.
And just because it was sung by a woman, my friend and I felt some lesbianic undertones. Which made it more beautiful in our opinion.
This is by far one of my favorites.
"Well anyway," she says, "I'll see you around..."
Oh words, like rain, how sweet the sound
And the words, they're everything and nothing
I want to search for her in the offhand remarks
Who are you, taking coffee, no sugar?
Who are you, echoing street signs?
Who are you, the stranger in the shell of a lover, dark curtains drawn by the passage of time?
In the terminal she sleeps on my shoulder, hair falling forward, mouth all askew
Fluorescent announcements beat their wings overhead: passengers missing, we're looking for you
And she dreams through the noise, her weight against me, face pressed into the corduroy grooves
Maybe it means nothing
Maybe it means nothing
Maybe it means nothing, but I'm afraid to move
And I know I don't want this
Oh, I swear I don't want this
There's a reason not to want this but I forgot
But she's looking at me, straight to center
No room at all for any other thought
And I never thought I would find her here: flannel and satin, my four walls transformed
"It's so beautiful here," she says, "this moment now,
And this moment, now"
---
For me, then, taking those set of rearranged lyrics, the story moves from a person meeting an ex-lover (or, in the context of the film she based the song off of, a lover who was wiped from his mind), and they strike up a conversation again, basically get to know each other anew. "Well anyway," she says, "I'll see you around" - so the relationship has a future. And then slowly they get closer, and he "searches for her", the "stranger in the shell of a lover" (the future lover, with the dark curtains to the lover she's going to be "drawn by the passage of time" - the time which hasn't *passed yet*).
And then - now this is very much my loose interpretation, I'm not sure why exactly I think this, it's just the images the song conjures for me personally - she ends up sleeping over with him at his house/apartment. "Flannel and satin" = pajamas, "my four walls transformed" = the place he lives - the physical representation of his entire life - is transformed entirely by her presence. Because she says it's "so beautiful here"... and then the song "ends" with this wonderful feeling of how time, life, really is, a string of "now"s passing us by and we can never live in the future or in the past. Just "this moment now". I don't know. It's just such a gorgeous, brilliant song, the way the lyrics play with the idea of time and intimacy.
... yeah, I don't know. I ramble too much.
I think the song made more sense to me personally before I started trying to piece it together backwards. I don't really understand -- if you reverse the verses, the story actually starts off with the couple feeling like they don't know one another anymore.
Regardless, it's absolutely one of my favorite love songs ever.
I love this song, though. It's written very nicely.
I'm actually afraid of looking too deeply into it, which is not something I usually experience with a song. There's something beautiful and intangible about the emotions expressed here that might hurt too much if I tried too hard. Maybe someday.
In the meantime, bless you, Vienna (from a fellow Stanford CS grad).