This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
Operator, number, please
It's been so many years
Will she remember my old voice
While I fight the tears?
Hello, hello there, is this Martha?
This is old Tom Frost
And I am calling long distance
Don't worry 'bout the cost
'Cause it's been forty years or more
Now Martha please recall
Meet me out for coffee
Where we'll talk about it all
And those were the days of roses
Poetry and prose and Martha
All I had was you and all you had was me
There was no tomorrows
We'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day
And I feel so much older now
And you're much older too
How's the husband?
And how's your kids?
You know that I got married too?
Lucky that you found someone
To make you feel secure
'Cause we were all so young and foolish
Now we are mature
And those were the days of roses
Poetry and prose and Martha
All I had was you and all you had was me
There was no tomorrow
We'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day
And I was always so impulsive
I guess that I still am
And all that really mattered then
Was that I was a man
I guess that our being together
Was never meant to be
And Martha, Martha
I love you can't you see?
And those were the days of roses
Poetry and prose and Martha
All I had was you and all you had was me
There was no tomorrows
We'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day
And I remember quiet evenings
Trembling close to you
It's been so many years
Will she remember my old voice
While I fight the tears?
Hello, hello there, is this Martha?
This is old Tom Frost
And I am calling long distance
Don't worry 'bout the cost
'Cause it's been forty years or more
Now Martha please recall
Meet me out for coffee
Where we'll talk about it all
And those were the days of roses
Poetry and prose and Martha
All I had was you and all you had was me
There was no tomorrows
We'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day
And I feel so much older now
And you're much older too
How's the husband?
And how's your kids?
You know that I got married too?
Lucky that you found someone
To make you feel secure
'Cause we were all so young and foolish
Now we are mature
And those were the days of roses
Poetry and prose and Martha
All I had was you and all you had was me
There was no tomorrow
We'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day
And I was always so impulsive
I guess that I still am
And all that really mattered then
Was that I was a man
I guess that our being together
Was never meant to be
And Martha, Martha
I love you can't you see?
And those were the days of roses
Poetry and prose and Martha
All I had was you and all you had was me
There was no tomorrows
We'd packed away our sorrows
And we saved them for a rainy day
And I remember quiet evenings
Trembling close to you
Lyrics submitted by yuri_sucupira
Martha Lyrics as written by Thomas Alan Waits
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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For me, it's Martha who says the last line and not old Tom Frost. The song only makes sense, to me, if it's Martha who says this.
The last line is in response to Tom putting his feelings to her. I imagine Tom spilling his guts out, a silence as he waits for her to say something, anything, then she says this line and more silence.....it puts shivers down my spine!
I think, Martha saying this adds more layers and questions to the song - she remembers her time with Tom dearly and has obviously thought about their time a lot too. But she does not tell him she loves him. He broke her heart ("All that really mattered then was that I was a man") and the more he has lived the more this has haunted him to the point that he called. Perhaps it's guilt and not love and Martha recognises this.
The reason I think this (apart from the above!) is that an ex of mine had to move away for a few months while we were going out. She used to write me letters and always signed them with the last line from this song. From that point onwards I realised this was Martha talking.
@FourSheetstotheWind Very astute. The story does come full circle if the last line was Martha's. And it gives the song even more poignancy.
Is it just me or is this song one of the best songs ever written?? It truley is Amazing!
I know someday I will be doing this, if I ever get to that age.
Now it's just about finding out who will I be calling.
Amazing. I love it
when i listen to this, i always think, "this realy has to be your fave song!" the best sad lovesong, ever!
this is great. amazing, yeah, like you said.
tom waits' voice inspires me to fight all the problems we have in this bastard life. martha is a beautiful song.
Possibly the saddest song ever written. Difficult to even hear it without crying...
Takes me back to the guy I fell for because (back then) he also loved Tom Waits. We listened to this song a lot, and I always suspected that we would somehow NOT end up together, and that someday I would hear "Martha" and think of calling him.
I was right.
Truly magnificent !!!!!!!!!!
And those were the days of roses, poetry and prose And Martha all I had was you and all you had was me. There was no tomorrows, we'd packed away our sorrows And we saved them for a rainy day.
I want to write & compose as geniously as this man