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Chinese Arithmetic Lyrics
Candle light, it burns in every hole of your eyes
It's beautiful, how much you'll never realize
So hush my love, there's something I'm to tell you now
Your time has come, around again my sleepless one
Your friend was young, hung and plastered
He never knew his own disaster
I think it's good, in fact it was faster
Cause it was you that he was after
Hold me now, as if you'll never let me go
Unhand me now, as if you've always known my name
His love was king, his love was master
He needed more, he needed always
He searched in vain for love and shelter
In every soul, in every hallway
So you thought she'd be sweeter than your girlfriend Peter
Well give it a second chance cause you've yet to meet her
We got the same ideas, we got the same old fears
They're different colors sometimes, but, hey, who cares?
Just years that tears our lives apart
Just like the time that you tried to teach your cousin to walk
He couldn't do it-push!-you told him twice
Well, I do man but it just don't jive
Tried so hard to control my behavior
I tried so hard, so hard to believe you
But now I live only to deceive you...
So kick and scream!
It's beautiful, how much you'll never realize
So hush my love, there's something I'm to tell you now
Your time has come, around again my sleepless one
He never knew his own disaster
I think it's good, in fact it was faster
Cause it was you that he was after
Unhand me now, as if you've always known my name
He needed more, he needed always
He searched in vain for love and shelter
In every soul, in every hallway
Well give it a second chance cause you've yet to meet her
We got the same ideas, we got the same old fears
They're different colors sometimes, but, hey, who cares?
Just years that tears our lives apart
Just like the time that you tried to teach your cousin to walk
He couldn't do it-push!-you told him twice
Well, I do man but it just don't jive
I tried so hard, so hard to believe you
But now I live only to deceive you...
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possibly stating the obvious, but i never knew this 'til no long ago.
the title comes from the phrase "like chinese artihmetic"... when something is hard or complicated, it's like chinese arithmetic.
my favourite mosley era song... however, i'm not sure what to make of the lyrics.
musically this is one of my favourite songs by fnm. i'll take a guess at the lyrics although i'm not certain.
it sounds like he is a witness and a friend of someone in a relationship which has problems and that he is concerned for one of the people in that relationship. maybe he is involved in a love triangle.
I kind of get the feeling that this song, and a few others from the Mosely era, are about Christianity, and how he's trying to convince himself it's the right way to go.
In the song, someone is struggling in life to find love and find their place in the world and is feeling empty (candle light, it burns in every hole in your eyes.). Their Christian friend is trying to convert them and trying to make them think that they will be happier as a Christian and that God's love is the only one that matters.
He is also talking about Mother Mary and how God is better than all the promiscuous sex he's having (So you thought she be sweeter than your girlfriend, Peter). Peter could be a reference to the one in the Bible or it could be the real name of the person the writer is talking about.
When he says teach your cousing to walk he could be talking about walking on water like Jesus did and now the main character is trying to convert other people to Christianity but he's really just "tearing lives apart". (These lyrics also appear in another song, R n' R, except there is no Peter and he says "teach your nephew to FART" instead of walk. I get the feeling that these were the original lyrics and they were changed to fit the Christian tone of this song)
In the end he just doesn't buy it and renounces Christianity ("Tried to control my behavior. I tried so hard, so hard to believe you, but now I live only to deceive you!").