Run

What I see here is a meditation on change, and particularly the changes experienced in love.

There's a parallel structure to these lyrics. The first set of verses personifies earth, and the second set personifies water. The images described are meant to illustrate the interactions and changes experienced between and within individuals as they proceed through life, interacting with the world and other humans.

It starts with images of fertility and growth, quickly followed by an acknowledgement of the inevitability of death (winter's punishing cold).

The last four lines within the first set of verses talks about twisting a bog man after marrying him. This is the pain and change of unity. A bog is a melding, a marriage of water and earth, to such a degree that it would be hard to characterize it as either state.

The passion we will later see described in water is particularly hampered, as bogs are necessarily stagnant. Water itself is twisted, stopped from acting like itself in any way, because of the love and embrace of the land. It's natural, not sinful, but it is a shame to be so shackled. Particularly as the earth has no difficulty maintaining her function and character in a bog. It is immutable and fertile as any other earth.

Now the second set of verses, the ones about water. Things are born, grow, and die in water as well, which is why water is a worthy lover for earth. They're both necessary for life, even as they're opposites in how they function. Land has weather and stability, water lacks both, for one example.

Shattering on her earth and the tears she'd weep are evoking rainfall for me. Rain being, of course, necessary for growth just as it's capable of flooding and destroying crops. It's lovely to describe it as shattering, it emphasizes the destruction of water on such an immutable surface as the earth. Again, it's the pain of unity.

Rushing to shore is obviously beach imagery, which is fascinating because it's one of the few aspects of the land that no longer supports life in a meaningful sense. The life you find there is washed up by the sea. It's one of the few places she gives up her purpose and bows to the water. It's also constantly being reformed, losing its physical structure.

And why does she bow down, why is there no life on a beach, why does it lose its shape? Because of white hands that fondle and beat her, the incessant foaming and crashing of the waves on her shores. She bows because she is both loved and hated with intensity and passion, acquiesces the tiniest bit of her shores as a concession to the passion and intensity of water. The earth, too, is changed like the water in a bog when faced with union.

Love changes people, consumes and twists them as they seek to please and control the other party in a relationship, as they both seek to form a unity rather than remain isolated individuals. There must be conflict, because perfect unity is impossible. If a unity is accomplished, as is the case with the bog man and the beach, neither party can remain entirely himself -- compromises and sublimation of self, concessions must happen.

I haven't unpacked it all. Unwrapping it slowly. But I thought I'd share what I have.