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Wish I Stayed Lyrics
Why can't we speak another language
One we all agree on
When men look outside, they see houses
Instead of the fields they grew from
We are constantly uprooted from them
Making us tiresome (and fearful)
Can you get up right now
Endeavor to free fall?
You can fall if you want to!
It's just a matter of how far
You've treasured our hometown,
But you've forgotten where you are
And it will stay with you until your mind's been found,
And it has been found wandering around
With that skipping rope, the trampoline,
The crafty smoke that made us choke
But we didn't give up hope
It's just the simple ways of getting paid,
The carelessness of running away
I wish I stayed
I wish I stayed
Patterns all arranged in my background
Pillars and posts keeping this country on form
Letters were all sent
With no addresses so that people can't discover
That we're always under cover
Why do I always draw triangles?
Instead of words this paper deserves
I don't own my clothes but I own my mind,
And it's not what you've lost but it's what you find
I don't own my clothes but I own my mind,
And it's not what you've lost but it's what you find
With that skipping rope, the trampoline,
The crafty smoke that made us choke
But we didn't give up hope
It's just the simple ways of getting paid,
The carelessness of running away
I wish I stayed
I wish I stayed
You can fall if you want to!
It's just a matter of how far
You've treasured our hometown,
But you've forgotten where you are
And it will stay with you until your mind's been found,
And it has been found wandering around
With that skipping rope, the trampoline,
The crafty smoke that made us choke
But we didn't give up hope
It's just the simple ways of getting paid,
The carelessness of running away
I wish I stayed
I wish I stayed
One we all agree on
When men look outside, they see houses
Instead of the fields they grew from
We are constantly uprooted from them
Making us tiresome (and fearful)
Can you get up right now
Endeavor to free fall?
It's just a matter of how far
You've treasured our hometown,
But you've forgotten where you are
And it will stay with you until your mind's been found,
And it has been found wandering around
The crafty smoke that made us choke
But we didn't give up hope
It's just the simple ways of getting paid,
The carelessness of running away
I wish I stayed
I wish I stayed
Pillars and posts keeping this country on form
Letters were all sent
With no addresses so that people can't discover
That we're always under cover
Why do I always draw triangles?
Instead of words this paper deserves
And it's not what you've lost but it's what you find
I don't own my clothes but I own my mind,
And it's not what you've lost but it's what you find
The crafty smoke that made us choke
But we didn't give up hope
It's just the simple ways of getting paid,
The carelessness of running away
I wish I stayed
I wish I stayed
It's just a matter of how far
You've treasured our hometown,
But you've forgotten where you are
And it will stay with you until your mind's been found,
And it has been found wandering around
The crafty smoke that made us choke
But we didn't give up hope
It's just the simple ways of getting paid,
The carelessness of running away
I wish I stayed
I wish I stayed
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She's amazing, and this song is an absolute gem. I think it's about leaving your hometown, and under appreciating it before, but coming to realise how good it was to you after leaving.
you dont know what youve got until its gone kinda thing.
you dont know what youve got until its gone kinda thing.
I've read somewhere that its about when she left her house in the countryside to live in the city and her missing her home. shes brill
I can't stand spelling mistakes and lack of punctuation... and there are some incorrect/missed out lyrics, so I thought I might as well do the whole thing. :) - Bear in mind this is the album version.
Why can't we speak another language, one we all agree on? Why and when men look outside, do they see houses, Instead of the fields they grew from? We are constantly uprooted from them, making us tiresome and fearful, Can you get up right now? Endeavour to free-fall.
'Cause you can fall if you want to, it's just a matter of how far, You've treasured your home town, but you've forgotten where you are. And it will stay with you until you're mind's been found, and it has been found wondering around.
With that skipping rope, the trampoline, The crafty smoke that made us choke, But we didn't give up hope. It's the simple ways of getting paid, The carelessness of running away, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed.
Patterns all arranged in my background, It's pillars and posts keeping this country on form. Letters were all sent with no addresses so that people can't discover. We're always undercover. Why do I always draw triangles instead of words this paper so deserves?
'Cause you see, I don't own my clothes but I own my mind, And it's not what you've lost, But it's what you find.
We found that skipping rope, the trampoline, The crafty smoke that made us choke, But we didn't give up hope. It's the simple ways of getting paid, The carelessness of running away, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed.
'Cause you can fall if you want to, it's just a matter of how far, You've treasured your home town, but you've forgotten where you are. And it will stay with you 'til you're mind's been found, and it has been found wondering around.
With that skipping rope, the trampoline, The crafty smoke that made us choke, But we didn't give up hope. It's the simple ways of getting paid, The carelessness of running away, Now, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed, I wish I stayed.
I think this song is about childhood memories of a place someone left behind in a careless moment wishing for something better. To me the first verse is talking about how people all think and speak differently, expressing a range of views which allows changes to happen over times. It’s also saying that no matter how much people may want time to move forward away from the past, and from their origins (roots and ‘feilds they grew from’) they will always wish to be brought back because life is tiresome and fearful. Tiresome in the way that life is much harder...
I think this song is about childhood memories of a place someone left behind in a careless moment wishing for something better. To me the first verse is talking about how people all think and speak differently, expressing a range of views which allows changes to happen over times. It’s also saying that no matter how much people may want time to move forward away from the past, and from their origins (roots and ‘feilds they grew from’) they will always wish to be brought back because life is tiresome and fearful. Tiresome in the way that life is much harder as you grow older and fearful in the way that the future creates more fear than past because in the past, everything has already happened whereas in the future anything can happen — It is unknown. This represents the climb forward only to want to attempt to fall back in time to when it was easier. (‘Can you get up right now, endeavor to freefall.)
So go ahead and fall if you wish and although you treasure the thought of returning to the good times, how much of the future are you willing to lose by taking your life backwards ('its just a matter of how far'). This part of the song (and the chorus as well) represents how wanting more just takes you in a circle because when you are in the early stages of life, you wish it to move forward to better places (carelessness of running away) but as you grow older you want to follow the rose-tinted memories back to when things were easy. But if you were to always be travelling back and forth through your life, switching between old memories and places, and wanting to hurry up your life, you can pretty qucikly lose your bearings (‘you’ve forgotten where you are’) and ‘your mind will be found wondering around’ between times and ages.
To me it seems obvious that the chorus is referring to a youth’s mistake of running away, wanting to escape childhood past. The way that the ending of that last verse and the chorus are linked (Wandering aroud with skipping ropes...) suggests at the journey between past and future and how life goes round in circles. The line that follows, ‘The crafty smoke that made us choke, but we didn’t give up hope’ is an interesting one. It implies that although moving away from bad memories and regrets seems like an intelligent (one definition of crafty) and a creative (another deifnition of crafty) thing to do, they were decieved by the ‘smoke’ that clouded their decisions, and were ‘choked’ as they realised that they’d made a wrong move in running away carelessly. And now they wish they’d stayed.
The second verse is quite dificult to make sense of. ‘Patterns arranged in my background’ could refer to how memories form always at the back of her mind. The second line could represent how this new region of life, so far away from the home town, is hard to maintain and keep stable. It could be talking about how people who move away wish to make some form of communication (e.g, writing a letter) with their old connections but sometimes cannot find the words to say and ‘instead of words this paper so deserves’ draw ‘triangles’ and ‘patterns’ with the thought of ‘background’ memories constantly on their minds.
‘I don’t own my clothes but I own my mind’ is quite confusing but could refer to how all people always own in life is their mind. Because it is the one thing in life that you cannot move away from. Your mind cannot be lost (as in physically detached from your body) and its not important what ‘you’ve lost’ but its what you find in life by moving on and trying new things, or deciding to move back to old things.
The whole song is basically referring to how people want to move on or move back and can’t decide where they want to be in life and eventually ending up going around and around in circles.
Absolutely love this song.
I think it's "And it has been found wandering around" instead of "wondering around". This song is lovely. I can't stop listening to it over and over again.
Ellie's songs are too addictive!
I love this song. I love this version the most: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_52p5nylTIc&NR=1 Its my fav song of her right now
ellie wrote this about moving from her home in hertfordshire to London and how much she missed her hometown and regretted moving away. Its about not appreciating the place where you grew up until it has gone