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Don't you cherish me to sleep
Never keep your eyelids clipped
Hold me for the pops and clicks
I was only for the father's crib
Hair, old, long along
Your neck onto your shoulder blades
Always keep that message taped
Cross your breasts you won't erase
I was only for your very space
Hip, under nothing
Propped up by your other one, face 'way from the sun
Just have to keep a dialogue
Teach our bodies: haunt the cause
I was only trying to spell a loss
Joy, it's all founded
Pincher with the skin inside
You pinned me with your black sphere eyes
You know that all the rope's untied
I was only for to die beside
So it''s storming on the lake
Little waves our bodies break
There's a fire going out,
But there's really nothing to the south
Swollen orange and light let through
Your one piece swimmer stuck to you
Sold, I'm Ever
Open ears and open eyes
Wake up to your starboard bride
Who goes in and then stays inside
Oh the demons come, they can subside
Never keep your eyelids clipped
Hold me for the pops and clicks
I was only for the father's crib
Hair, old, long along
Your neck onto your shoulder blades
Always keep that message taped
Cross your breasts you won't erase
I was only for your very space
Hip, under nothing
Propped up by your other one, face 'way from the sun
Just have to keep a dialogue
Teach our bodies: haunt the cause
I was only trying to spell a loss
Joy, it's all founded
Pincher with the skin inside
You pinned me with your black sphere eyes
You know that all the rope's untied
I was only for to die beside
So it''s storming on the lake
Little waves our bodies break
There's a fire going out,
But there's really nothing to the south
Swollen orange and light let through
Your one piece swimmer stuck to you
Sold, I'm Ever
Open ears and open eyes
Wake up to your starboard bride
Who goes in and then stays inside
Oh the demons come, they can subside
Lyrics submitted by thuglifeforevs
Track duration: 04:10
"Calgary" as written by Justin Deyarmond Edison Vernon Matthew Mccaughan
Lyrics © Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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"Propped up by your other one/face way from the sun"- I think he's sitting in the boat, shielding his eyes from the sun.
Then there's a storm, which is symbolized by the increasingly powerful guitars and drums (plus the first line of that bit of the song is "so it's stormy on the lake"). "Little waves our bodies break" - the water is washing over them but they don't mind.
"Your one piece swimmer stuck to you"- they're getting even wetter, obviously.
Then the storm subsides and they row back to shore to dry off and go to sleep. He wakes up the next morning and she's still there ("wake up to your starboard bride")
Also, the incomprehensible voice at the very end of it is a phone message, left by Bon Iver's manager Kyle Frenette. If you listen to the isolated multitracks for the song, you can hear understand it better- it's something like "...ask two people to pay, and that's not really great, in fact I like really don't want to pay two people right now." I don't think it has anything to do with the rest of the song, it was probably just stuck in there as an easter egg.
Justin Vernon stated that the song was made as he dropped out of college and was travelling around Europe. He was in Ireland and he met a man named Paul from Calgary, and this song was written about him. He said they still stayed in touch throughout the years and he was a very, very close friend.
His own words of the meaning of this song :)
I believe this video is talking about LIFE.
-looking at the beginning scene, there is a bed and little beads of light that swim to it.
(this represents an egg and sperm)
-as the lights illumination the bed, an image of a girl appears
(the fetus)
-soon, we see a scene where she is in the sheets and she is unveiled
(i picture a baby in the womb right before its born)
-then she is released from the bed
(represents being released into life on your own)
-she meets a boy
(love)
-we notice how neither of them are wearing shoes
(i think its represents trials, hard to walk in mud without shoes)
-then the scene where they are in the woods
(trees represent life, but the trees looked dead and ill, i think it represents sickness)
-the part were they set the lake on fire
(fire usually means death, i image this is the end of the young lovers journey in life and the stones represent their soul flouting amoungst eternity together)
the last scene was kinda confusing..
-the scene where people seem to be looking into the ground upside down and a bear figure comes out
(the people looking down into the ground represent the funeral and loved ones, the bear that appears in a mist of fog could represent comfort and warmth in their hearts)
And I must say, the video to this song visualizes Calgary not as a sort of Calvary, but as Ithaka, the mythological home of the Greek hero Odysseus (or Ulysses, if you're feeling Roman). There are many allusions to the epic story. In the opening scene, a bed is thronged by weird sperm-like things that never manage to reach this beautiful, rather inert-looking woman under a topsheet. She seems to be protected by it. Leaves sprout from the mattress, and we see that the bed posts are made from living, rooted trees. In the Odyssey, Odysseus and his young bride Penelope had built their palace around a marriage bed, constructed of 4 living olive trees. When Odysseus is away at war for many years (and is presumed by many to be dead), Penelope fends off would-be suitors for more than a decade by completely involving herself in weaving a burial shroud. She disconnects from all others and half lives in a trance-like state, awaiting the return of her husband.
What I like about this video is that it visualizes the song from her point of view. Because the vocals are male, the default assumption would be that Justin is speaking of his own (or at least a man's) experience. But in the video, the imagined lover, somewhere out there, is the guy. The woman is the dreamer, the seeker.
By the way, isn't she also a former contestant on America's Next Top Model?
"hip, under nothing
propped up by your other one, face 'way from the sun"
I just picture a couple in bed, maybe they've just made love and they're lying in bed talking. She on her side no sheet covering her "hip under nothing, propped on your other one" If she was facing him, back to the window, she would from his perspective be bathed in sunlight, glorious.
I don't know just speculating, but I have to say I love how he can paint a picture with just a few words
"When I wrote this song, I'd never been to Calgary - still haven't been - and I had a few really close friends that I'd met throughout the years from Calgary, and it always seemed like a place that I felt connected to. This song sort of became about an envisionment, a place, about when you think there's somebody out there that you could be in love with but you haven't met them yet. And it sort of became a metaphor for places you haven't been but that you feel like you know, and you can sort of have that feeling about somebody you haven't met that you feel like you're supposed to be with."
And in an interview with NPR, he says this while talking about Beth/Rest:
"Calgary sort of introduces that idea... eventually, you start waking up to the fact that you might be ready to spend your life with somebody and still feel good about who you are and what kind of changes you're going to go through no matter what."
So, hope that says something.