It's not a song about suicide. It's a song about old age and forgetfulness.
Verse one, he's lost track of how many Advil he's taken since the bottle was new, and wonders who could have taken the missing pills, as he compulsively counts them again and again.
Verse two, he nervously rehearses a speech in front of the bathroom mirror, but can't find it in his pockets, and briefly forgets that he's just standing in the bathroom practicing. The "lecturn" he's gripping is the sink in front of his bathroom mirror. (The "audience" is his reflection, the description of which is what is really going on. Hence: Clearing my throat and gripping the lecturn I smile and face my audience clearing its throat and smiling with his hands on the bathroom sink. Kind of reminds you of the word pallendromes from "I Palendrome I", doesn't it?)
The references to not recognizing himself and seeing the "broken figure" will become all to familiar to you as you get older. We tend to hold a memory of what we look like, and that's what we see most of the time when looking in the mirror, except for occational moments of clarity when we suddenly see a new face where our young image once was. Trust me on this if you have not experienced it.
The comment about his head falling off, and how it "may not be a long way off" is a play on the old saying about absent-minded people who keep misplacing their glasses and stuff: "He would lose his head if it wasn't attached." It has nothing to do with self-decapitation.
It's not a song about suicide. It's a song about old age and forgetfulness.
Verse one, he's lost track of how many Advil he's taken since the bottle was new, and wonders who could have taken the missing pills, as he compulsively counts them again and again.
Verse two, he nervously rehearses a speech in front of the bathroom mirror, but can't find it in his pockets, and briefly forgets that he's just standing in the bathroom practicing. The "lecturn" he's gripping is the sink in front of his bathroom mirror. (The "audience" is his reflection, the description of which is what is really going on. Hence: Clearing my throat and gripping the lecturn I smile and face my audience clearing its throat and smiling with his hands on the bathroom sink. Kind of reminds you of the word pallendromes from "I Palendrome I", doesn't it?)
The references to not recognizing himself and seeing the "broken figure" will become all to familiar to you as you get older. We tend to hold a memory of what we look like, and that's what we see most of the time when looking in the mirror, except for occational moments of clarity when we suddenly see a new face where our young image once was. Trust me on this if you have not experienced it.
The comment about his head falling off, and how it "may not be a long way off" is a play on the old saying about absent-minded people who keep misplacing their glasses and stuff: "He would lose his head if it wasn't attached." It has nothing to do with self-decapitation.