The song, to me at least, seems to be a remembrance of a few moments in a relationship that defined it. The shifting perspective between the "voices" of the song and between times (the distant past, promises made in one moment in a field a long time ago) gives a sense of endurance of the feelings expressed in that moment, despite the absence of one of the lovers, perhaps due to death.
The forgetting of the sun is a motif that I think shows the man (from whose point of view I think the third verse is sung) as not thinking about the essential impermanence of their relationship- the setting of the sun is a metaphor for ending, although in the last verse the metaphor is used in the alternate sense- the sun is of course still there, seemingly eternal, and its presence above the field perhaps triggering the memory.
I interpret the song to be sung by an unwillingly absent lover, who, at the same time she (I think the song is from a female point of view) promises to stay, knows that one day she will have to leave- passage of time and the fact that only the happy memories invoked by that moment remain speak to me of a close relationship, most clearly expressed in that one moment in the field that was forced apart in the distant past, which the survivor has not forgotten.
The song, to me at least, seems to be a remembrance of a few moments in a relationship that defined it. The shifting perspective between the "voices" of the song and between times (the distant past, promises made in one moment in a field a long time ago) gives a sense of endurance of the feelings expressed in that moment, despite the absence of one of the lovers, perhaps due to death.
The forgetting of the sun is a motif that I think shows the man (from whose point of view I think the third verse is sung) as not thinking about the essential impermanence of their relationship- the setting of the sun is a metaphor for ending, although in the last verse the metaphor is used in the alternate sense- the sun is of course still there, seemingly eternal, and its presence above the field perhaps triggering the memory.
I interpret the song to be sung by an unwillingly absent lover, who, at the same time she (I think the song is from a female point of view) promises to stay, knows that one day she will have to leave- passage of time and the fact that only the happy memories invoked by that moment remain speak to me of a close relationship, most clearly expressed in that one moment in the field that was forced apart in the distant past, which the survivor has not forgotten.