The singer is reminiscing about the subject of the song who is in the past. Past romance the singer lost. Hence the subject is a beautiful swan in photo only. The singer was the active party full of desire, but the subject was not convinced. The singer could only get partially through to her through the cracks. The singer does not want to slave or con the subject, hence encouraging her to do the "right thing" which in this case mean following her feelings. Her feelings took her away from the singer. The singer feels the pain of this decision, but still stands by his choice of encouraging her do follow the path of her feelings because her going with him would not have been a long term solution in any case. He had lost the race from the start. He only wanted to stay with her if he knew it was for good. But they both knew it was not.
The singer is reminiscing about the subject of the song who is in the past. Past romance the singer lost. Hence the subject is a beautiful swan in photo only. The singer was the active party full of desire, but the subject was not convinced. The singer could only get partially through to her through the cracks. The singer does not want to slave or con the subject, hence encouraging her to do the "right thing" which in this case mean following her feelings. Her feelings took her away from the singer. The singer feels the pain of this decision, but still stands by his choice of encouraging her do follow the path of her feelings because her going with him would not have been a long term solution in any case. He had lost the race from the start. He only wanted to stay with her if he knew it was for good. But they both knew it was not.