Below My Feet

This song is about a death causing a crisis of faith and rejection of an old belief system, which is followed by a new view on religion and life, which is described in the chorus.

The first stanza addresses the dead person, who is "cold as the blood through your bones." But he also describes the "light which led us from our chosen homes" as cold. He resents the light (referring to the light people are alleged to follow into the afterlife) for taking people away from the lives that they build for themselves on Earth. This death has caused resentment for God and the afterlife. He is lost, without his loved one and without his faith.

The second stanza builds on this. He sleeps and cries. All he knew (his previous belief system) is steeped in blackened holes. He sees holes in his religion. They are black. This is a dark time. He doesn't want to see these holes or have these doubts, but they're there. He is lost.

(I'll get to the chorus at the end)

The next two stanzas are accompanied by a louder and more defiant beat than the first two, which are slow and sad.

He is still. He's surviving, kind of dealing with this death. But he's under someone's "spell." I think he's referring to a preacher or someone else who indoctrinated him in his old belief system. The choice of the word spell clearly indicates that he has a negative view of this person's influence, under which he was convinced that Jesus was telling him all his well. He sings the last line "so all must be well" with a tone of sarcasm and anger. He was being calmed (I was still) by this old belief system, but it was like a drug, a sedative.

Just give me time. Leave me alone. Now he's telling this preacher that he has different desires than him. He is rejecting the old belief system. The person he is addressing wants to wrap his flesh in "ivy and in twine." Ivy brings to mind images of ivy covered churches and an aged smothering feeling. Twine is also negative, controlling. We wrap meat in twine. This is all a reference to the typical Christian rejection of all things related to sex. He is rejecting this attitude. Again "for I must be well" (by being wrapped in ivy and twine) is spoken sarcastically and defiantly.

Now the chorus. It's a prayer that sums up his new requests of God. Keep the Earth below my feet. Keep me alive. But also, perhaps, keep me down to Earth. For all my sweat, my blood runs weak. Despite all his efforts, he gets closer to death every day he lives. He's giving up his fear of death, or perhaps asking God to take it away. Let me learn from where I have been. Help me continue to become a better person. Keep my eyes to serve, my hands to learn. I don't completely get this yet, but I love it. It's a reversal of what you would expect. Perhaps it's about him wanting to live, to learn by acting and making mistakes. It could be viewed as a reversal of the traditional Christian view of learning by watching and listening to your parents and preachers, and then serving God and others through your actions which conform to these teachings. He's going to learn by doing, and serve by watching and listening, because what better way to serve people than to make them feel watched and listened to. I think it's also about humility. We usually think we're smarter than those we help because we've learned by watching, and we can help others by doing what we've learned. But he is suggesting that we can better serve those people by listening to and learning from them, and we can better learn by doing.

There's so much more to this song, from the subtle nuances of word choices, to the chanting, the changes in musical tempo. It's packed with meaning.

Their songs are often religiously motivated, but never preachy. They're about personal experiences, usually struggles, with religion. I love it.