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See the Leaves Lyrics

Without hope
Without love
She sees herself
From below and above

Her untied hand
She smears the spit
Pleasure and suffering
Her beliefs conflict

It brings a smile
She cannot pretend
To believe that life
Really has no end

See the leaves
They're dying again
See the moth
It's flying again

See the leaves
They're dying again
See the moth
It's flying again
See the grass
It's dying again
See the sun
It's trying again
It's trying again
It's trying again
It's trying again
It's trying again
It's trying again . . .
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Cover art for See the Leaves lyrics by Flaming Lips, The

This song, like the rest of the album, is terrific, and its lyrics are quite amusing to decipher.

Let's analyze the piece stanza by stanza according to my interpretation:

1) To start with, we get a hopeless and unloved woman who objectifies herself. She simultaneously looks down on herself hatefully and idolizes herself with no hope of ever being who she wants.

2) Her hair is untied and possibly cleaned/styled using her own saliva??? This could mean she lives a sort of carefree lifestyle, not concerned with fashion/appearance. Or her unkempt demeanor could represent her poverty and suffering. Juxtaposed, these two lifestyles conflict.

3) And yet, it makes her happy to live this way, but also, returning to her hopeless outlook on life, it constrains her to believe that there is no life after death.

4-end) The leaves dying serve as proof for her fatalistic beliefs, and yet another moth is flying again, which goes against her notion that there is no life after death. The grass dies, but then the sun brings it to life again. Apparently the woman is only able to see death; she is, after all, hopeless and without love. In spite of all of this, the sun persists. Perhaps the significance in the repetition of this verse is to show how the sun, the giver of life, perseveres in the face of death. It is possible the poetic voice in this song has faith that the woman will eventually see the light.

Overall, the song is dichotomized conceptually into two contradictory and yet complimentary notions: that all things die, and that is the end for them, yet life is born anew out of death, and so, in a manner of speaking, there is, indeed, an afterlife. But these are just my musings...

Cover art for See the Leaves lyrics by Flaming Lips, The

what a blast. the new record will be really strange. love it.

Cover art for See the Leaves lyrics by Flaming Lips, The

alot of the songs on the album seem to be about a girl (her, she etc.) perhaps this could be the girl on the album artwork?

My Interpretation

Yes! There are a lot of "she" references on the album. I'm assuming the lyrics are about the girl on the cover, and the whole concept of "embryonic" being related to birth, the girl coming out of a vagina, etc. I love concept albums because you really get to see an entire story unfold, like a movie, but not so obvious.

Not Valid
Cover art for See the Leaves lyrics by Flaming Lips, The

Are you guys serious? She's obviously a symbol for something that's of feminine nature, that is loosing hope, entangled in a web of pleasure and suffering...? get it?

if not that latter half of the song should tie it up for ya ;D