Washington Square Lyrics
It couldn't come with me
I locked up my bedroom
And I walked out into the air
When nothing I needed
Is left there behind me
I walk out through the shadows
Of Washington Square
And I heard the songbirds of Ballyporeen
I love like a fountain
And it left me like nothing
Just the memories of walking through Washington Square
Where light is electric
And time is just a number
That rests on a wall
Nobody knows me
My friends and my family
Are as far from this city
As Washington Square
In a blanket of starlight
I will follow this freeway
Out into the air
In case you should wonder
And wanted to find me
I'm traveling homeward to Washington Square
In case you should wonder
I'm in Washington Square
Washington Square
Washington Square
Being that they're from Berkeley, could this be about the Washington Square in San Francisco?
It sounds like a man who became successful with a wife but love failed him and now hes looking at the clock at the bar feeling alone looking for his friends and family that have apparantly distanced from him.
To me it's about going home. The man presumably Adam has acomplished alot in life visited a lot of different places, "I wandered the highways from Dublin to Berkeley." and just wants to go home again. I think jmw543 has a good point to me it is the Washington Square in New York because that is where i am from but it could be a different washington square depending on where your home is. Everybody loves coming home.
Just a thought...
Maybe the song is about Adam's unwillingness to write and tour. It sounds like he locks his room and leaves, but maybe he really locks himself in his room and stays... his mind leaves. In his mind he goes all over searching for love and answers. I think at the end he finds the answers he is looking for.
on Live from SoHo, Adam says:
"This song I started right after I moved here [NYC]... I'd come back from tour and lost someone, and was faced with the prospect of going back out again, and it seemed like a hard thing to leave New York behind"
The lyric is actually
"And i heard the songbirds of Ballyporeen"
Ballyporeen is the town from which Adam Duritz's then girlfriend (Irish singer/songwriter Gemma Hayes) is from. The song is written in the aftermath of the breakup of their relationship.