So this has been.my favorite song of OTEP's since it came out in 2004, and I always thought it was a song about a child's narrative of suffering in an abusive Christian home. But now that I am revisiting the lyrics, I am seeing something totally new.
This song could be gospel of John but from the perspective of Jesus.
Jesus was NOT having a good time up to and during the crucifixion. Everyone in the known world at the time looked to him with fear, admiration or disgust and he was constantly being asked questions. He spoke in "verses, prophesies and curses". He had made an enemy of the state, and believed the world was increasingly wicked and fallen from grace, or that he was in the "mouth of madness".
The spine of atlas is the structure that allows the titan to hold the world up. Jesus challenged the state and in doing so became a celebrated resistance figure. It also made him public enemy #1.
All of this happened simply because he was doing his thing, not because of any agenda he had or strategy.
And then he gets scourged (storm of thorns)
There are some plot holes here but I think it's an interesting interpretation.
If I can't let you go will darkness divide?
For the fiction of love is the truth of our lies
We were playing for keeps, but we both knew the cost
Now the only way out's in your heart-shaped box
But I hate that it seemed you were never enough
We were broken and bleeding but never gave up
And I hate that I made you the enemy
And I hate that your heart was the casualty
Now I hate that I need you (need you, need you, need you)
As we rest here alone like notes on a page
The finest to compose could not play our pain
With a candle through time I can still see your ghost
But I can't close my eyes, for it
(For it is there where you haunt me most, haunt me most)
(Where you haunt me most)
I hate that it seemed you were never enough
We were broken and bleeding but never gave up
And I hope that I sing through your memory
As we echo through time in the melody
Now I hate that I need you
And I hear you now when you said it hurt
But it had to fall, fall apart to work
As I see you now in what's left of me
Is it too late to plead insanity?
'Cause I hate that it seemed you were never enough
You were broken and bleeding in the name of love
And I hope that we meet in another life
I hope that we meet in another life
I don't hate that I need you (I don't hate that I need you)
I don't hate that I need you (I don't hate that I need you)
I don't hate that I need you
For the fiction of love is the truth of our lies
We were playing for keeps, but we both knew the cost
Now the only way out's in your heart-shaped box
But I hate that it seemed you were never enough
We were broken and bleeding but never gave up
And I hate that I made you the enemy
And I hate that your heart was the casualty
Now I hate that I need you (need you, need you, need you)
As we rest here alone like notes on a page
The finest to compose could not play our pain
With a candle through time I can still see your ghost
But I can't close my eyes, for it
(For it is there where you haunt me most, haunt me most)
(Where you haunt me most)
I hate that it seemed you were never enough
We were broken and bleeding but never gave up
And I hope that I sing through your memory
As we echo through time in the melody
Now I hate that I need you
And I hear you now when you said it hurt
But it had to fall, fall apart to work
As I see you now in what's left of me
Is it too late to plead insanity?
'Cause I hate that it seemed you were never enough
You were broken and bleeding in the name of love
And I hope that we meet in another life
I hope that we meet in another life
I don't hate that I need you (I don't hate that I need you)
I don't hate that I need you (I don't hate that I need you)
I don't hate that I need you
Lyrics submitted by EternalTearsOfSorrow
Another Life Lyrics as written by Christopher Cerulli Andrew Fulk
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
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This song seems to be about how the narrator doesn't feel like himself, but even in the darkness, he still thinks of this girl he loved and cares about her very much and he hates that he is isolated from her. He wants to see her in another life because if he does, hopefully he'll be able to make up for the ways he wronged her though he never meant to hurt her