1
If this was the Cold War we could keep each other warm
I said on the first occasion that I met Marie
We were crawling through the hatch that was the missile silo door
And I don't think that she really thought that much of me
I never had to learn to love her like I learned to love the Bomb
She just came along and started to ignore me
But as we waited for the Big One
I started singing her my songs
And I think she started feeling something for me
We passed the time with crosswords that she thought to bring inside
What five letters spell "apocalypse" she asked me
I won her over saying "W.W.I.I.I."
She smiled and we both knew that she'd misjudged me
Oh Marie it was so easy to fall in love with you
It felt almost like a home of sorts or something
And you would keep the warhead missile silo good as new
And I'd watch you with my thumb above the button
Then one night you found me in my army issue cot
And you told me of your flash of inspiration
You said fusion was the broken heart that's lonely's only thought
And all night long you drove me wild with your equations
Oh Marie do you remember all the time we used to take
We'd make our love and then ransack the rations
I think about you leaving now and the avalanche cascades
And my eyes get washed away in chain reactions
Oh Marie if you would stay then we could stick pins in the map
Of all the places where you thought that love would be found
But I would only need one pin to show where my heart's at
In a top secret location three hundred feet under the ground
We could hold each other close and stay up every night
Looking up into the dark like it's the night sky
And pretend this giant missile is an old oak tree instead
And carve our name in hearts into the warhead
Oh Marie there's something tells me things just won't work out above
That our love would live a half-life on the surface
So at night while you are sleeping
I hold you closer just because
As our time grows short I get a little nervous
I think about the Big One, W.W.I.I.I.
Would we ever really care the world had ended
You could hold me here forever like you're holding me tonight
I look at that great big red button and I'm tempted
I said on the first occasion that I met Marie
We were crawling through the hatch that was the missile silo door
And I don't think that she really thought that much of me
I never had to learn to love her like I learned to love the Bomb
She just came along and started to ignore me
But as we waited for the Big One
I started singing her my songs
And I think she started feeling something for me
We passed the time with crosswords that she thought to bring inside
What five letters spell "apocalypse" she asked me
I won her over saying "W.W.I.I.I."
She smiled and we both knew that she'd misjudged me
Oh Marie it was so easy to fall in love with you
It felt almost like a home of sorts or something
And you would keep the warhead missile silo good as new
And I'd watch you with my thumb above the button
Then one night you found me in my army issue cot
And you told me of your flash of inspiration
You said fusion was the broken heart that's lonely's only thought
And all night long you drove me wild with your equations
Oh Marie do you remember all the time we used to take
We'd make our love and then ransack the rations
I think about you leaving now and the avalanche cascades
And my eyes get washed away in chain reactions
Oh Marie if you would stay then we could stick pins in the map
Of all the places where you thought that love would be found
But I would only need one pin to show where my heart's at
In a top secret location three hundred feet under the ground
We could hold each other close and stay up every night
Looking up into the dark like it's the night sky
And pretend this giant missile is an old oak tree instead
And carve our name in hearts into the warhead
Oh Marie there's something tells me things just won't work out above
That our love would live a half-life on the surface
So at night while you are sleeping
I hold you closer just because
As our time grows short I get a little nervous
I think about the Big One, W.W.I.I.I.
Would we ever really care the world had ended
You could hold me here forever like you're holding me tonight
I look at that great big red button and I'm tempted
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This song is about the constant battle between ideals and reality. What we wish and what we want against what inevitably will happen. This constant struggle is one of the few things that attaches itself as much to war as much as it does to love, and this song deals with both.
I think in the song he represents reality and that Marie represents ideality. He says things like, “I never had to learn to love her/Like I had learned to love the bomb.” Meaning, he used to have these ideals–that war was bad and something we could avoid–but as time raged on, he realized that some things are necessary evils. If he controls the bomb, he has a hand in controlling reality.
On the other hand, she “would keep the warhead missile silo good as new.” Even though she’s wrapped up in the war, she still is possessed by ideals and hopes, that idea that we can resolve things without hurting or killing people. And he loves her for that, because she’s different because ideal is more innocent than reality. Reality is harsh, ideals are peaceful.
The tense as the song continues changes. Instead of here-and-now present tense, it switches to the conditional tense. He says things like “would” and “could” because he knows the inevitability of reality. That this war is going to end them and end everything. When she goes to sleep he “holds her closer just because” and he thinks about the war and its outcome: “Would we ever really care if the world had ended?/You could hold me here forever/Like you’re holding me tonight.”
His temptation is ending the world because right now he feels safe and warm and loved and he knows–like the realist always does–that dying from this is inevitable. And he would rather control when he dies and how he dies.
And even though love and war have some of the same issues and problems, in the end it’s better to die in love than in war, and his temptation is choosing that. Choosing his fate and her fate, so in the timeline of forever, for their eternity, they will always be together. If he doesn’t push the button now, their “love with live a half-life on the surface” because they would get ripped apart and probably die separated or worse–alone.
It’s the same temptation of Adam and Eve: What’s idyllic versus what’s real.