Lyrics for The Sea and the Rhythm as interpreted by alreadyiamlonely

The Sea and the Rhythm Lyrics
Tonight we're the sea and the salty breeze
The milk from your breast is on my lips
And lovelier words from your mouth to me
When salty my sweat and fingertips

Our hands they seek the end of afternoons
My hands believe and move over you

Tonight, we're the sea and the rhythm there
The waves and the wind and night is black
Tonight we're the scent of your long black hair
Spread out like your breath across my back

Your hands they move like waves over me
Beneath the moon, tonight, we're the sea

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Arienette
06-24-2004

Rated 0 
this is the most beautiful song i have ever heard in my life and i do believe it is about sex. a beautiful description

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sweetadeline
06-27-2004

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I completely agree

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squee_4_me
10-20-2004

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...wonderful :)

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blackbanner
10-25-2004

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it is a beautiful song, but i don't think it's about sex. i'd say it is about his relationship with his mother, as many other of his songs are (upward and over the mountain, to name one)

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gs
11-10-2004

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Uhhhh . . . unless Sam Beam is into incest I don't think this one's about his mother. The sea and the rhythm are meant to mimic the sexual act.

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alreadyiamlonely
01-03-2005

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i agree. i feel this song is far too sexually laced to be about his mother.

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supercilious304
03-09-2005

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I love this song... his voice is so sentual- so amazing-

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Wilsong
03-16-2005

Rated 0 
Sex is the wrong word...i think he truly loves the woman with the long black hair. Who ever it may be...hopefully his wife...I think rather than it jsut being about sex, he is talking about the things that are more beautiful than sex....and sam beam covered every one of those things in this song... Mr. Beam has done it again....

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_cardigan
04-02-2005

Rated 0 
This song is so beautiful. It takes my breath away, for lack of better phrase.

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emifinan
04-16-2005

Rated 0 
Definitely about making love.
Perhaps while she's pregnant?

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music*ismyboyfriend
04-22-2005

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Yeah, i agree not about the pregnant part though, but i love it. So sweet, so mellow, and so calmning i love it.

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jmen
05-01-2005

Rated 0 
I love this song, I think it is a goergeous song... but I am not exactly sure what it means... I first heard it in the 1st season finale of The OC (The Ties That Bind). It was such a sad song in the scene when Ryan was about to leave... sad sad sad moment... anyways what do you guys think this song means?

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drowningnoah
05-10-2005

Rated 0 
i don't think its supposed to be a sad song. its a poem about good lovin.

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SamLamb
05-25-2005

Rated 0 
This song is about love...a love that trancends talking about the actual act of making love...he is i believe relating his love for the ocean or sea & all of it's quirks into this feeling he recieves from this woman... for him...this act of love is more than anything that can be said.. it is so breathgiving that he can only describe it by means of the route of our creation.. the earth itself:) This song is my my favorite Iron & wine song... i have seen him twice and he still has not played it... i hope one day to hear it live:)

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sofresh
06-30-2005

Rated 0 
I want to have sex on the shoreline while this song plays. Plays from some hidden speakers. Hidden surround sound I mean. Not cheap speakers though, more like Bose. That would be tight.

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silence in the dark
07-16-2005

Rated 0 
I thought this song was absolutely beautiful when I heard it. I've never heard it done by Iron and Wine but I've heard someone play it before. I almost fell asleep while I was listening to it just because the guitar chords were so soothing.

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sondrad
07-17-2005

Rated +1 
Allegorically (sp?), the sea is endless, boundless, deep and mysterious. Its ends have not been discovered and its depths have not been explored. This is the love these two people are experiencing. It knows no bounds, it is thrilling and magical and boundless. The rhythm of the sea is undulating and in perfect syncopation. When you are in love,, that is how it feels to be making love- perfectly and instinctually choreographed.

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lethological
07-23-2005

Rated 0 
beautiful. it's about two people whos love is in perfect harmony. sorry, that sounded a bit like a fortune cookie..

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jennieclaire
12-08-2005

Rated 0 
"Wow" might be the only word I can muster about this song. The imagery is so strong, I am there on the beach, where there is nothing but me and him and the salt from the sea and our sweat, when your breath and the crash of the waves fall into the same rhythm, and you are in the moment.

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camshaft
12-29-2005

Rated 0 
this song is about a boy and his girl whose name was levie. it is about her long black hair and the salty breeze that belongs to them alone and would blow for them alone when they came and lay on the shore and watched the wind and the moon. and they danced by the light of the moon to a silent symphony, and could hear nothing but the sounds of the sand against their skin outside and the pounding of their hearts inside.

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emiliee
01-22-2006

Rated 0 
i love this song. its soo soothing and happy but sad at the same time. im going to see iron and wine and calexico-does anybody no if sam will play any of his own songs, or just ones off the joint album?

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long4mellow
02-25-2006

Rated 0 
This song is most definitely about making love to someone you are one with. Breathtaking and soft.

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doondawg
04-13-2006

Rated 0 
I think this song is about Sam's love of women. The feminine ideal. Its more than just his lover or his mother. There is a lot of symbolism about love making and post-coital cuddling. Also there is a reference to milk on his lips---clearly his mother. The imagery about the waves and the moon are about femininity in general. The women he loves, not just one.

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tinyflowers
04-28-2006

Rated 0 
Me and my boyfriend used to listen to this song together. not just because it was sexual but because its soooo soothing and beautiful. i love it.

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kev404
10-20-2006

Rated 0 
First off.....BEAUTIFUL SONG!!!! But then again, what has Sam done that isn't? Anyways... My take on this was originally that is about his mother rocking him as a baby. I don't claim to "know" that this is right, but i will definately try and support my claim:
---milk from your breast is on my lips-------
not many ppl. seemed to want to go into this when they said this was solely about sex. I'm asking you to look at it for what it is. Poets don't write things for no reason. i personally have trouble equating drinking breast milk with sex. I mean, its sensual, but not in an erotic or sexual way. It's about the close bond between a mother and child. Hence, this line (in my opinion) specifically refers to what has been going on before these thoughts occur. (milk is on lips)
---Lovely your/lovelier(not sure) words from your mouth to me------------
Infants hear words without recognition of what they mean. I think babies can sense moods from how someone is speaking. I feel that the mother is singing to the child because of this line. The baby hears the words and recognizes they are lovely, even without knowing their meaing.
---my hands...move over you---------
Reminds me of how a baby clutches to its mother when being breast fed.
---we're the sea and the rhythm there----------
Just as waves in an ocean have a rhythm as the tide moves in and out, I feel that the baby is being rocked in a rocking chair back and forth.
---waves and wind and night is black----------
Eyes closed (all of these things are black, and therefore in his imagination), the infant imagines simplistic things like the ocean.
---Scent of long black hair, spread out like your breath across my back-------------
The infant's senses are strong because his mind is still developing. So he smells his mothers hair, which is laying over his back like her breath, which is on his back as well. She is holding him and rocking him to sleep, so they are close. He is small enough to be held, so hair & breath can spread out easily across his tiny back.
---Your hands move like waves over me--------
His mother is rubbing his back, perhaps burping him as he has just been fed, according to my theory of the song. Simplistic thought of an ocean (like waves...) as he dreams and drifts to slip/burps?
---Tonight, we're the sea------------
Yes, i know. When people have sex, they roll around in bed and they are connected. I think this is very intentionally meant to sound borderline sexual because of the EXTREMELY close bond between a mother and child. Ginsburg wrote about his mother in a similar manner, but he was more extreme. I think if we look at it from the narrators perspective, though(an infant) we would not see this as sexual because Infants have no knowledge of sex. They just feel things. This song is mostly about feeling things. It really makes me long to go back to the time of innocence when things were so simple. We obviously can't remember those times very well becuase our minds were still growing. We cannot go back to our infancy because, besides the obvious physical impossibilities, we have no real recollection of such a time. I feel that this song is an attempt to do just that. To seek the end of afternoon and see things through innocent eyes again.

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