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Live Oak Lyrics
There’s a man who walks beside me he is who I used to be,
and I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
And I wonder who she’s pining for on nights I’m not around
Could it be the man who did the things I’m living down
I was rougher than the timber shipping out of Fond du Lac
When I headed south at seventeen, the sheriff on my back
I’d never held a lover in my arms or in my gaze,
So I found another victim every couple days
But the night I fell in love with her, I made my weakness known
To the fighters and the farmers digging dusty fields alone
The jealous innuendos of the lonely-hearted men
Let me know what kind of country I was sleeping in
Well you couldn’t stay a loner on the plains before the war
When my neighbors took to slightin’ me, I had to ask what for
Rumors of my wickedness had reached our little town
Soon she’d heard about the boys I used to hang around
We’d robbed a great-lakes freighter, killed a couple men aboard
When I told her, her eyes flickered like the sharp steel of a sword
All the things that she’d suspected, I’d expected her to fear
Was the truth that drew her to me when I landed here
There’s a man who walks beside me he is who I used to be,
And I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
And I wonder who she’s pining for on nights I’m not around
Could it be the man who did the things I’m living down
Well I carved her cross from live oak and her box from short-leaf pine,
and buried her so deep, she’d touch the water table line
And picked up what I needed and I headed south again
To myself, I wondered, “Would I ever find another friend”
There’s a man who walks beside her, he is who I used to be,
and I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
and I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
And I wonder who she’s pining for on nights I’m not around
Could it be the man who did the things I’m living down
When I headed south at seventeen, the sheriff on my back
I’d never held a lover in my arms or in my gaze,
So I found another victim every couple days
But the night I fell in love with her, I made my weakness known
To the fighters and the farmers digging dusty fields alone
The jealous innuendos of the lonely-hearted men
Let me know what kind of country I was sleeping in
Well you couldn’t stay a loner on the plains before the war
When my neighbors took to slightin’ me, I had to ask what for
Rumors of my wickedness had reached our little town
Soon she’d heard about the boys I used to hang around
We’d robbed a great-lakes freighter, killed a couple men aboard
When I told her, her eyes flickered like the sharp steel of a sword
All the things that she’d suspected, I’d expected her to fear
Was the truth that drew her to me when I landed here
And I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
And I wonder who she’s pining for on nights I’m not around
Could it be the man who did the things I’m living down
and buried her so deep, she’d touch the water table line
And picked up what I needed and I headed south again
To myself, I wondered, “Would I ever find another friend”
and I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
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This song is about the impact of sobriety (NPR Interview):
Along with sobriety came a whole new set of concerns, which Isbell channeled into Southeastern. "Live Oak" begins with the lines, "There's a man who walks beside me / He is who I used to be / And I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me."
"I worried about what parts of me would go along with the bad parts, because it's not cut and dried," Isbell says. "It's not like you make the right decision, and everything's great, and you're a better person for it. You are, you know, at least 51 percent better. But there are some things that are lost forever, and that's just a fact of it."
He says he was concerned about the impact his sobriety would have on all of his personal relationships.
"I was thinking, 'Well, what do they like?' " Isbell says. " 'Do they like that guy? What combination of those two guys are gonna make those folks stay in my life?' Luckily, most of the people that I really cared about were there for me. And I think at the core, I still have the same values. I just actually behave according to those values now a lot more."
NPR: http://www.npr.org/2013/06/10/190372187/jason-isbell-a-southeastern-songwriters-path-to-sobriety
Interesting little story about a man who did some terrible things as a very young man that he obviously now regrets. He's trying to run away from that life and settles down in a small town with a girl that he has fallen in love with. He's thinking he can settle down and live here, when he starts to suspect that the girl is more drawn to his old self than his new. The stories of his past life catch up with him, and soon the neighbors in the town start avoiding him. When he finds out they know, he comes clean with the girl. He was worried she would be horrified by him, but turns out, she is delighted with this side of him. Knowing he doesn't want to go back to that life, and that he has to keep running. He kills the girl, buries her and moves on hoping to find the next small town where he can settle down.
I agree with most of that, but I don't think he kills her. You don't kill someone and then make a coffin and mark their grave with a cross. We don't know how much time passes between him telling her the truth and her death; for all we know, they live together for 50 years. I think she just dies, of sickness or old age, and he buries her, as people used to do back in the day. I think it's about finding someone who truly understands even the darker sides of you, and then outliving them and finding yourself...
I agree with most of that, but I don't think he kills her. You don't kill someone and then make a coffin and mark their grave with a cross. We don't know how much time passes between him telling her the truth and her death; for all we know, they live together for 50 years. I think she just dies, of sickness or old age, and he buries her, as people used to do back in the day. I think it's about finding someone who truly understands even the darker sides of you, and then outliving them and finding yourself alone again.
@Kafziel Interesting. Don't think I would have ever interpreted it that way, but it certainly adds a different dimension to it. Though an anticlimactic one. What would be the point of the friction that is building between the two over her fasciation with his evil side only for the two to live out a peaceful life together. I don't agree with your assessment that "you don't kill someone and then make a coffin" There is something clearly anachronistic about this story, it isn't modern day. It is set in a time where a barely-marked grave in the...
@Kafziel Interesting. Don't think I would have ever interpreted it that way, but it certainly adds a different dimension to it. Though an anticlimactic one. What would be the point of the friction that is building between the two over her fasciation with his evil side only for the two to live out a peaceful life together. I don't agree with your assessment that "you don't kill someone and then make a coffin" There is something clearly anachronistic about this story, it isn't modern day. It is set in a time where a barely-marked grave in the woods would not raise many eyes. And the fact that he "picked up what he needed and headed south again" kind of implies that he is on the run again. If he had been settled for 50 years, why run?
When you hear a song like this you take a step back and marvel at the creative genius displayed by true artists. While Isbell claims the song is about getting sober, it's just as much about being a drunk. I worked in Chicago for a time and lived in the nearest west suburb of the city and took the El trains back and forth to work. The city itself was dry (as in Prohibition dry), but its neighbor was not. As a result, I would go two stops further down the line every Friday to stop...
When you hear a song like this you take a step back and marvel at the creative genius displayed by true artists. While Isbell claims the song is about getting sober, it's just as much about being a drunk. I worked in Chicago for a time and lived in the nearest west suburb of the city and took the El trains back and forth to work. The city itself was dry (as in Prohibition dry), but its neighbor was not. As a result, I would go two stops further down the line every Friday to stop a the liquor store at the end of the line in the neighboring town and buy a case of Jack Daniels. I worked myself up to a fifth a night, and an extra stop or two every week before it was over. I was single and had a friend and his wife over one night and he watched in amazement as I downed the fifth during the course of the evening. I remember him asking me as left that morning "Are you alright?" I nodded and said, "sure," and waived good night. I got up each morning, showered, shaved and went to work. The bottle cost me several of the most meaningful relationships of my 20s. I know that while I've been sober for 30 years, that man still walks beside me, more so to remind me of what I was and what I had done than to be confused as to who I am by others. He's my ghost. The murders and the metaphorical death in the song are about those losses I talked about along the way. While Isbell says the song's about getting sober (which if he says it is, it is) in my estimation a much better ode to sobriety is "Cover Me Up."
First of all, I really like the song and it holds meaning for me. I really don't like the girl getting murdered, as it makes this man more of a serial killer than a lover. However, considering the song a metaphor rather than a story without metaphor makes more sense to me. It seems to me that the man he used to be was once again becoming that man, and he needed to respond to this in a firm manner. The girl then represents his relationship with alcohol that he thought was over, even though he was aware it walked beside him, he thought he had overcome it well enough. Once he realized this was not the case he became violent and buried this new beginning of the old life as deep as he possibly could and moved on, hoping to finally become more grounded in his relationship with sobriety.
This song is an allegory about a man, post-addiction looking at his life, his past, and reflecting on his relationship. From hard-won experience, I know when you have immersed yourself in the life of an addict, you view life through the prism of your bondage. It colors everything you see and everything you feel. When you crawl out of that hole, there is the fear of "Will they still like me? Will I still like them? Can I even function?" After 20 years of opiate addiction, many of the people I knew had never known me sober. I was terrified. I was lucky to have left the area and made a new start, but I was still with my girlfriend (who was never a user/addict) and there were friends that I still loved and didn't want to lose. Bur, as is usually the case, most of those relationships blossomed. My girlfriend, who stood by me and loved me when I was living like a wounded, feral animal and could still see good in me, has marveled at the transformation. But I will live with what and who I was for the rest of my life. That feral animal was "..a man who walks beside me, he is who I used to be.."