Angel of Small Death & the Codeine Scene

I'm trolling a little, but there's a really direct and obvious way to interpret this one.

I watched the work of my kin, bold and boyful, Toying somewhere between love and abuse, Calling to join them, the wretched and joyful, Shaking the wings of their terrible youth.

Lots of people fuck around with drugs when they're young and are perfectly fine. That's what the "codeine scene" is: young people who play with codeine, an over-the-counter medication in most countries, to get a little high and enhance their partying. Most of these people never do anything alone, never graduate to anything much harder, and knock it off when they stop being young and reckless. The protagonist here acknowledges that there's danger and harm to be found here (abuse, wretched, terrible), but also pleasure and greatness (bold, boyful, love, joyful, terrible). He decides to join in the fun.

Freshly disowned, in some frozen devotion, No more alone or myself could I be, Lurched like a stray to the arms that were open, No shortage of sordid, no protest from me.

Instead of finding something to enhance his partying, his having fun with others like himself, he found something that made him feel "alone" and "[him]self". Instead of shaking his wings and being active with the rest, he found a "frozen devotion", a stillness that has more of dedication, commitment, and obsession than youthful playfulness. He took whatever he could find ("lurched like a stray to the arms that were open") that would produce that feeling, even if it was less innocent than codeine ("no shortage of sordid"). He no longer minds that he's troweling through dangerous parts of town and supporting criminals and cartels, he won't protest the guns and death, he wants what he wants.

With her sweetened breath and her tongue so mean, She's the Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene. With her straw blonde hair, her arms hard and lean, She's the Angel of Small Death and the Codeine Scene.

Most of the heroin one finds in Britain is brown, heroin base. This is better smoked than administered in any other way (hence the sweetened breath and the straw blonde coloration). Her arms, naturally, are hard and lean like a needle. The basic thrust of her being a cruel master that feels too enjoyable not to indulge in, as noted by most of the older interpretations here, is obvious.

Feeling more human and hooked on her flesh, I lay my heart down with the rest at her feet, Fresh from the fields, all fetor and fertile, It's bloody and raw but I swear it is sweet.

He doesn't feel human, doesn't feel well without her. That's what it means to be hooked. It's the point when you can no longer abstain and feel okay. And he's reached it. "[L]ay my heart down with the rest" points out that it can't be a person -- this Angel has transfixed and stolen the hearts of many, and she keeps them rather than cycling through people as a woman would have to do. "Fresh from the fields" is another nod: People don't come from fields, but poppies sure do. "It's bloody and raw", sex tends not to be, but injection-points always are.

In leash-less confusion I wander the concrete, Wonder how better now having survived, The jarring of judgement and reason's defeat; The sweet heat of her breath in my mouth, I'm alive.

Punctuation is frequently very important in Hozier lyrics, and it's kind that he provides it in his liner notes. Reason is not defeating his unhealthy attachment to a woman. Rather, his reason and judgement have been defeated, and he relies upon the "sweet heat of her breath" to live, to feel like a person again. Without it he feels dead and cold. "Wonder how better now having survived" acknowledges that his life has been fundamentally altered in an incomprehensible and terrible way. "[L]eash-less confusion" is a lack of self-control, the confusion implies not really understanding what he's doing, or why he's doing it, when he goes out to "wander the concrete". It isn't an active, fully-conscious decision, he just finds himself doing it, zombie-like. What he's doing as he wanders city sidewalks is trying to score. And he does so successfully, as the last line of the verse indicates. Because he's smoked the heroin he bought, he gets to feel alive at the end of the song.

It's great that people can find their own meanings in songs, it really is, but to my ears this is one of the least ambiguous things he's ever written. Maybe it's a metaphor, but the narrative feels much more intuitive if the song is read as simply personifying heroin.

Drugs shift from youthful, playful experimentation, a way to have fun, to something you ultimately need just to feel alive at all. From something you choose lightly, to something that you will do anything to get, even against your better reason and judgement, even against your own moral scruples. That's the narrative. At least as far as I can see.