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| Audioslave – I Am the Highway Lyrics
| 5 years ago
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@[M12CH:27693] I took the meaning of the pearls and swine to be a reference to feeling unworthy of salvation, lower than a swine. Also notable from a Biblical perspective is the Biblical references to a "Highway" from the land Assyrian land where God's people were oppressed. The highway leads only the righteous among men to the "Kingdom to Come" on Earth as in Heaven.
If I am the Highway, you use me to get get to Heaven. If I am too close to you it is because i don't feel worthy of your love. If I feel no sorrow or pity - I am the sky - Void and empty inside. |
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| Audioslave – I Am the Highway Lyrics
| 5 years ago
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@[Zacattack:27692] Agreed. This is a hugely somber song about an inability to connect with humanity or the divine.
One thing most of the commentators miss here is Isaiah's Biblical "Highway". It is the road the righteous are promised will lead them to a promised land of inner peace and harmony between men. |
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| Audioslave – I Am the Highway Lyrics
| 5 years ago
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Pearls and swine bereft of me - Bible Reference saying he is not worthy of salvation and lower than swine.
Lost in the cities and alone in the Hills - Lost in the secular world of men (cities) and lost in the search for the sacred in nature (In the Bible, Pagan religions always went to mountain tops to find their gods).
I am not your rolling wheels. I am the Highway - I can not lead you to peace and harmony, I am the one you walk upon.
I am the sky - I am void and empty as the sky.
Friends and liars don't wait for me - I don't know who my friends are. All I know is all of them walk all over me.
And still feel too close to you - I don't know if you're my friend or my enemy but I love you too much to let you go as you see through me or walk all over me.
I am not your blowing wind, I am the lightening - I feel distant from you, I am dangerous and threatening to you, fear me. Fear me so that you might leave me be.
I am not your autumn moon. I am the night: I am not beautiful inside, you do not see who I really am. There is only darkness as of the night inside of me. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Video Games Lyrics
| 8 years ago
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@[wednesday181:5935] Good info. It's worth noting that if you had the ability to insert your wishes into the fabric of a harsh reality you could control it - like life is a video game. |
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| Regina Spektor – Baby Jesus Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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@[asortofdream:3710] By "Biblical[ly] unsound practices in this case I'm specifically referring to the Catholic practice of kissing statues (i.e. idols). And the equally unfounded practice of judging and, worse, the pagan practice of cursing non-believers. |
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| Regina Spektor – Baby Jesus Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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What I gather from this song is that she's making fun of Biblical unsound practices in Christianity yet finds herself moved by the devotion of those involved in the behavior. With a partial fear and trembling in her heart, she puts the baby Jesus in her closet to see if it will grow within her own heart but doesn't honestly expect it to. It seems fairly clear to me that Regina is a deeply spiritual person but its hard to tell if she follows a particular religion beyond saying Abrahamic monotheism. |
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| Flyleaf – Cassie Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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@[Tostitos__:1489] Does "spared" in your way of thinking mean the same thing as "survived a shotgun blast"? Because Valeen wasn't spared. She survived. |
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| VNV Nation – Nemesis Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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Simply stated: the cries for "justice" against the guilty are themselves demands for unjust and inhumane treatment against those that oppose our sense of personal empowerment. The goddess Nemesis herself is said to be so hungry for justice that she is ultimately incapable of exacting justice. She endlessly tips the scales of justice in one direction then compensates by shifting the weight to the other side of the scale. This is not justice it is retribution. It is us demanding retribution for the smallest slights and yet remaining largely apathetic to the most important and egregious injustices.
Think back to a time you were insulted. For example, which hurt you more? Genocide in Darfur or being mockingly labeled a "fag" by your peers. Which will draw you to righteous indignation faster? Mass murder of children in Netwon or being cut off in traffic? |
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| VNV Nation – Nemesis Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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A lot of the comments here say this is about minority rights but it's not. Nemesis is a reference to "Nemesis" the Greek goddess of retribution. The song itself is about our tolerance for injustice by the powerful the equally insane demands for injustice against the powerful by the weak. |
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| The Rolling Stones – Sympathy for the Devil Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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@[DorianMode:820] It is a Satanic mockery of the Christian God to call him Satan's other half. God is not evil and does not lay souls to waste. If the songwriter is referring to God here it's NOT with any understanding of the Christian religion. |
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| Flyleaf – All Around Me Lyrics
| 9 years ago
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@[downforbreakfast:467] My first thought was that she's talking about speaking in tongues but really I think it's a reference to silent prayer. |
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| Florence + the Machine – What the Water Gave Me Lyrics
| 10 years ago
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I took this to be a song about someone who slowly drowns in a metaphorical sense. She lays down in the water and allows the water to wash over her bode but makes no attempt to escape as the currents push pebbles into her pockets and cover her body. Eventually, the pebbles/rocks hold her down under water never to surface again.
First you lose hope. Then you drown. |
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| Hilltop Hoods – I Love It Lyrics
| 10 years ago
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I agree with the last comment. Feeling down and out. So I'm getting drunk. I'm working hard. And loving it.
The pay off is the bringing a crowd to an empty field/parking lot. It makes me feel heavenly. Even when I'm touring with the band or lost in some sound loop no matter how lonely, frustrated, or bored I feel - I love it. I just love it.
The best thing about this track for me is the ending of the music video. For those of you that have seen it take a moment to think what's in the treasure box the find? I suspect they found each other in the moon lit mirror. |
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| Florence + the Machine – Only If for a Night Lyrics
| 10 years ago
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I took this to be a tune about getting in touch with your inner child. The narrator has a dream about being a child (hence wrapping arms around legs). In the dream the practical advice is "let your body be loose and free. burn, alight with a passion for life". To a child that is practical advice. Sadly, we can't be children forever. Only if for a night. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Ride Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I think riding in the context of this song refers to escaping an overwhelming sense of doom by running (or rather, riding) away from problems. However, you can't really run away from your problems. Unless your choose to change yourself your problems will always catch up to you eventually.
It also sounds like she's finding freedom among outlaws. The homeless nomads are every bit as at war with themselves as she is with herself. She's learned to find liberation in the realization that life itself is transient so one is free to live fast and die young. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Ride Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I think you're right, she imagines that her "real" family is Elvis, Marilyn, and Jesus. This is an attempt to escape a harsh reality and salvage her self-esteem through fantasy/wishful thinking/denial of reality. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Ride Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Brilliant observation! I was trying to make sense of this phase and failing before you mentioned it. |
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| Lana Del Rey – This Is What Makes Us Girls Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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When Lana gets sent away on the train, that is supposed to be her escape from childhood. She's supposed to be moving onto adulthood. In reality, she just adopts the same bad habits in the new place. She's refusing to grow up and celebrating her own immaturity. |
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| Lana Del Rey – This Is What Makes Us Girls Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I initially thought this is a song celebrating femininity. I realize now that the term "girls" in this song is referring to her own budding sense immaturity and irresponsibility. In most aspects of the song she's trying to be more like an adult but in very irresponsible ways. For example, she's got a job at 16 but she's drinking on the job with the boss.
In essence, she's resisting the transition to adulthood and saying "this is what make's us girls". |
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| Abney Park – Airship Pirate Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Can someone explain why my comment is receiving down thumbs for pointing out the hilarious genius of Airship Pirate? |
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| Lana Del Rey – Video Games Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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The important thing I forgot to mention above is that Lana says that she had decided to put her career aspirations on the back burner for this man. She seems to been willing to regulate herself to the boring role of house wife to keep "swinging with old stars" (drunk with love). |
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| Lana Del Rey – Video Games Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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YouTube has an NME interview with Lana specifically discussing Video Games. It seems that Lana is describing a boyfriend she was madly in love with "visually" who used to sit at home playing video games. Lana is so in infatuated with him that she sits beside him while writing her songs.
Lana claims that the musical composition, lyrics, and vocal style all embody her essential characteristics and that Video Games is an intensely personal song for her. She had no idea that it would be the songs fans would fall in love with. |
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| Local H – All The Kids Are Right Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Lana Del Rey is notorious for this. Check out her SNL version of "Video Games". She's so nervous she sounds terrible despite being a fantastically talented performer. |
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| Local H – All The Kids Are Right Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I think the important thing to remember here is that every band has a bad day or two when they're constantly on the road. It's about feeling like you let down the fans for one sub-par show. |
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| Local H – All The Kids Are Right Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Great insights! I'd agree with you but like to add that I just discovered an alternate lyrics version where the chorus line, instead of being "all the kids..." is more like "something in my mind won't let me heart and head and mouth connect it. Something in my mind won't let my heart out of the darkness, yet. It's not over, I'm not sober anymore". |
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| Hilltop Hoods – The Nosebleed Section Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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It took me several listens to realize the band isn't ripping on the fans who end up in the stands. I used to think it was a tribute to the fans that put up with being covered in beer and spit in the front row of small bar show.
When I thought about it I realized the band is trying to share with ALL the fans the feeling of being on stage and being song writers. I was never actually sure if the "nosebleed section" is a play on the idea of being high up in the bleachers that your nose bleeds or so close to the speakers that your ears bleed. |
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| King Crimson – 21st Century Schizoid Man Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Fantastic observation Dylan!
I made an alternate interpretation of the surgeon as the soldier in a later posting. The soldier performs lobotomies with his bullets. Given the ethically questionable psychological and scientific experiments by the government in that era, I have to wonder if you are not absolutely correct. |
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| Orgy – Fiction (Dreams In Digital) Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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This song strikes me as being about addiction to technology. Her "coma where it's beautiful" is a reference the viral spread of online entertainment as a substitute for chemical drugs in escaping a harsh reality.The addiction becomes so intense that the digital medium infests even her dreams and subsequently causes her to ask the immortal philosophical question "Am I really real?". Is her addiction to digital entertainment and lack of self-control an indication that she is the entertainment source for some artist in a parallel universe?
Ultimately, the narrator realizes that he is in control of the addiction and "your pixel army can't save you" from hitting the power switch on the computer and really living her real life. Alternately, perhaps it is paradoxically the narrator threatening to shut off her life to prove his free agency to himself.
Marilyn Manson's Dissociative is a great lyrical compliment to this song. I think Manson is discussing how technology overtakes us and removes us from reality against our own will. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Million Dollar Man Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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From the chorus line "one for the money and two for the show" (an Elvis Presley reference), I think this song is about a woman who dreams of being a star. Her relationship with a man who makes her feel like a million dollars still plays second fiddle to her career aspirations and obsession with creating music. The "million dollar man" is someone crazy enough to tolerate her craziness and brilliant enough to understand her thinking. She appears to leave him for reasons she either doesn't understand (because he's too good for her) or she lets him go to follow a career path. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Million Dollar Man Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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It's doubtful that a man who is "brilliant and screwed up" would be successful in any kind of conventional terms. His character would be his most valuable asset to an equally troubled partner. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Million Dollar Man Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Your posting gave me another idea: The million dollar man is the one who is perfect for her. The good fortune of finding such a man is like a broke girl suddenly stumbling across a million dollars.
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| Lana Del Rey – This Is What Makes Us Girls Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I like Violet's view. It's an acknowledgement that an eventful life as teenager almost universally involves a self-centered defiance of authority and total commitment to one's friends. |
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| Lana Del Rey – Video Games Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I think she's simply saying that she sacrifices her best interests to a man in the name of love. She's playing life like a surrealistic adventure game to keep her relationship alive. |
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| Paula Cole – Me Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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The "golden ring of wisdom in my cave" is likely a reference to allegory of Plato's Cave. Essentially, Plato suggests that ideas (perception) rather than the material world that creates our sensory experiences defines our reality. It is the prerogative of the philosopher to show us who "me" is. Cole is not just being autobiographical, she is trying to show us who we are.
The phrases about "I'm not" is also reminiscent of shedding the ego in Buddhism. Cole is suggesting that killing the ego (the "me") is the greatest fear many of us have. However, abandoning ego shows helps us see what is really important in our lives: loving oneself and pursuing our passions. With self love and goal fulfillment, we are ready to love others.
I love the lines about the folded wings. The resting moth with folded wings seeks to blend in with its surroundings and therefore appears unremarkable. The moth that is fearlessly pursuing its life goals is beautiful and colorful. |
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| Marilyn Manson – Disassociative Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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From some of the egocentric and lame brained statements I've heard from Manson in interviews, I have no doubt that his shallowness (rather than intelligence) prevents the song from being anything but literalism. |
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| Marilyn Manson – Disassociative Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Spot on Creaper. You might thoroughly enjoy reading Richard Stiver's "Shades of Loneliness: Pathologies of a Technological Society". Interestingly, your comment predates the 2004 publication of his book which share your general thesis. |
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| Marilyn Manson – Disassociative Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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There are clear connections between the use of dissociative class drugs and psychological concept of dissociation. Your perspective is probably partially correct but the song seems more about loss of identity and feeling due to technological overload. Technology itself is a psychedelic drug. Timothy Leary defined the internet as the LSD of the 1990s. |
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| Poets Of The Fall – Roses Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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In retrospect, maybe he's asking for help. He finds he can't find a way to help himself until he discovers the wisdom of the medicine main (perhaps a psych doc?). But anyway, note the theme of curing pain with positive actions. Also note that the vocalist repeats the word "do" several times after talking about accomplishing positive actions. |
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| Regina Spektor – Laughing With Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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Nbril, I'd agree with you except that the author never actually defines who or what God is. Is God our better nature? Is God the worst in us? Is God separate from us? Is he beside us? |
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| King Crimson – 21st Century Schizoid Man Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I want to compliment your interpretation of the poison paranoia. I missed the American anti-communist hysteria of the 1950s-1990s when thinking about this song. Perhaps then the neurosurgeon is the soldiers performing lobotomies with bullets at the behest of the ideals of their political leaders? |
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| King Crimson – 21st Century Schizoid Man Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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The Schizoid Man is one whose moral values are contradictory. The song is written in the context of an unwinnable war and senseless competition to consume. It is a criticism of American culture in the era of its composition and remains relevant today.
"Cat's foot" and "iron claw" is reminiscent of Neil Young's "Kinder, gentler, machine gun hand". Here the lyrics are a reference to the dichotomy of modern man's value system. He wants to tread quietly (peacefully) but he's also the hunter (cat) who will strike without mercy (iron claw) against his opposition. The false belief that one can be more peaceful and more violent at the same time is sheer insanity.
The "neuro-surgeons screaming for more" is a reference to men who seem to have it all. He has brilliance, wealthy, prestige, a beautiful wife, and yet somehow that is not enough for him. Fear of losing his possessions drives him to paranoia and misery. It is sheer insanity to strive for everything and yet be happy with nothing.
"Blood rack, barbed wire" represents the amorality of war. The "politician's funeral pyre" is an unwinnable war. To stave off his own political suicide, the politician allows his military forces to burn innocents with "napalm fire". The idea of slaughtering thousands to save one is moral insanity.
Death is sown throughout the world so that the neuro-surgeon can have even more than the everything he has now. Acquiring resources from one person means having to take resources from the "poet's starving children". Wanting what you do not need is moral inanity. |
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| Regina Spektor – Laughing With Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I'd agree with those who say that this song isn't a religious or anti-religious endorsement. If anything Regina is promoting a "live and let live" attitude toward the schism between faith and accusations of fiction.
FYI, the line of this song that kills me: "The last thing you'll see is a pair of hateful eyes". A reference to dehumanization and murder. What a horrible evocative image. Yet we're prone to seeing such needless dehumanization between theists and atheists on this very thread. |
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| Regina Spektor – Laughing With Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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I agree. It also crossed my mind while reading interpretations that both theists and atheists view the same information in completely contradictory ways with disinterest in exercising the necessary level of insight to find the slightest bit of common ground. |
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| Poets Of The Fall – Roses Lyrics
| 11 years ago
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My initial thinking is that this is a religious song. But there is a definite spiritual epiphany - perhaps not a connection to God - but nevertheless, a theme of spiritual growth. |
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