Hope There's Someone

The watershed is the the surface between air and the sea. As seals live in the water, 'the seal's watershed' is the entrance to the graveyard in the sea. In the Guide to San Francisco Bay Area Creeks, there is a mention of the Seal Slough Watershed and The Seal Creek Watershed, which includes: Leslie Creek, Borel Creek, Beresford Creek, Laurel Creek, Marina Lagoon. Seeing as how Antony partially grew up in San Francisco...age 10 to 19...it makes sense for him to refrence this this specific watershed.

I love how the chords at the end of the song begin with an atmosphere of confusion and tension and gradually become more open and clear and end up almost euphoric. Beautiful progression.

I don't think it's so much his fear of death as it is more his fear of dying alone. And not necessarily without a love partner, but more just a life partner, if that makes sense. It's a crying out for someone to care about him enough to save him from getting stuck in that in between place. I think he just wants someone to be his confidante, of sorts. And it's almost like he's saying that if you have that then death doesn't seem to be nearing at the pace that it always is, if you have that someone death is no longer an impending part of the equation. I think the line "Hope there's someone who'll set my heart free/Nice to hold when I'm tired" and "How can I fall asleep at night/How will I rest my head?" Just shows his yearning for someone to take his worries from him, when worries sometimes can feel physical. I think he just feels alone, and wants someone to listen to him. To patch him up when he needs it. Or at least that's what I think.

Holy shit, is all I can say...I was completely startled by Antony's voice when I first heard this - well, scared, I guess...but it was just such a beautiful song. So emotional and perfect. I love Antony's voice now - it's amazingly amazing.

It's beautiful expression, to me, of the fear experienced by an agnostic (I don't say "atheist" because the "hope" shows that the narrator hasn't given up on the existence of a superior being); you can't believe any of the propositions put forward by established religions, but the thought of really being uncared for on a universal scale is terrifying. Maybe i really am antlike and insignificant, maybe there's no purpose to life, and maybe there is no justice in death. The relationship the narrator describes is like a long term lover (I know from experience how you can love someone so much it fills the human spiritual need,as though they give life its purpose,and Antony so often blurs the lines between spiritual love and love of another human), or almost like a parent, protecting and caring, the way they seem when you are a child and mum and dad can make everything better. If they suddenly weren't there, you'd be left vulnerable and alone. I really really hope there's someone, but I just can't believe... Sorry guys, bit deep there...

how many people cried when they first heard this song? i can't describe it. it was the first aatj song i heard and it just did something to me. it makes me want to die

oohhhhhhhhh. really, what more can be said about how this makes me feel? beyond tears (but i am literally shivering, not from physical cold, as i listen to this). who needs drugs when there's music like this? (hence my username). i can't stop listening to this song. "beautiful" is a pathetically inaccurate word

my parents don't like aatj because they think antony sounds "too queer." personally, i'm a practicing and believing monotheist, but i don't understand how someone damned for his sexuality could have been given such a gift in life; homophobia doesn't make sense, especially when listening to this

i think this is as much about yearning for true love and acceptance--in this life-- as much as fear of death; other than that i don't have much to say about the song's meaning that hasn't already been said here, except about the seal's watershed: someone said it's referring to a leaking seal, but watershed is actually an ecological term referring to wetlands around rivers, etc; here it may mean the middle place referred to earlier, not quite the solid ground of life but not the deep water of eternity either. the seal may be the line between life and death that's supposed to be clear-cut but isn't and instead is somewhere hidden in the watershed. or it might just have a personal meaning to him

aah, rambling comment. oh well. this song is the kind that fills my body, my heart, my soul, and threatens to tear me apart. i had to say something

Beauty in death is what this song is all about. The person is on the brink of death, can't sleep without the fear of never waking up. The song's undeniable beauty and moving piano and strings show the wonder of life and the beauty of death. Despite being about fear it also provides great resolution about death and the idea of going to some world. A song to be listened to when watching the sunset out of site of buildings and roads and modern features.

"Oh, I'm scared of the middle place / Between light and nowhere / I don't want to be the one / Left in there"

i don't think i've ever read a more articulate description of a person's fear of death, or heard a more painful and beautiful vocal performance singing about the topic. and the end of the song, when the piano picks up and he starts to just sing, it's so cathartic. antony is absolutely amazing.

Just beautiful...

It also appears to me to be a song about the fear of death, but not so much fear of the act of dying or suffering pain, but being stuck between this life and whatever is next. The second half of the song which I feel is the speaker's character dying, leaves me time for contemplation of what comes next... re-incarnation, becoming a ghost or an eternity of nothingness, yet the harmonies fill me strangely with optimism as if although we will never know until we get there, the final breath of the dying leaves us our hope for when our time comes.

Anyway, as always, just my opinion...