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Hey, oh
Sheets of empty canvas
Untouched sheets of clay
Were laid spread out before me
As her body once did
All five horizons
Revolved around her soul
As the earth to the sun
Now the air I tasted and breathed
Has taken a turn
Oh and all I taught her was everything
Oh I know she gave me all that she wore
And now my bitter hands
Chafe beneath the clouds
Of what was everything
Oh the pictures have
All been washed in black
Tattooed everything
I take a walk outside
I'm surrounded by
Some kids at play
I can feel their laughter
So why do I sear
Oh, and twisted thoughts that spin
Round my head
I'm spinning
Oh, I'm spinning
How quick the sun can, drop away
And now my bitter hands
Cradle broken glass
Of what was everything
All the pictures had
All been washed in black
Tattooed everything
All the love gone bad
Turned my world to black
Tattooed all I see
All that I am
All I'll be
Yeah
I know someday you'll have a beautiful life
I know you'll be a star
In somebody else's sky
But why
Why
Why can't it be
Why can't it be mine
Sheets of empty canvas
Untouched sheets of clay
Were laid spread out before me
As her body once did
All five horizons
Revolved around her soul
As the earth to the sun
Now the air I tasted and breathed
Has taken a turn
Oh and all I taught her was everything
Oh I know she gave me all that she wore
And now my bitter hands
Chafe beneath the clouds
Of what was everything
Oh the pictures have
All been washed in black
Tattooed everything
I take a walk outside
I'm surrounded by
Some kids at play
I can feel their laughter
So why do I sear
Oh, and twisted thoughts that spin
Round my head
I'm spinning
Oh, I'm spinning
How quick the sun can, drop away
And now my bitter hands
Cradle broken glass
Of what was everything
All the pictures had
All been washed in black
Tattooed everything
All the love gone bad
Turned my world to black
Tattooed all I see
All that I am
All I'll be
Yeah
I know someday you'll have a beautiful life
I know you'll be a star
In somebody else's sky
But why
Why
Why can't it be
Why can't it be mine
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Twenty years we have reconciled as friends. Something I thought impossible.
We were out with friends for dinner, listening to a great local band. A band that was friends with my band. During a break they asked me to come up a sing a set. We sang Black and I noticed "she" left in a hurry during the song. I closed the set early and hit the streets looking for her. She was across the street, sitting on the kerb, smoking her first cigarette in twenty years. She had always thought of us when she had heard this song and used to fantasize about me "growing up' and realizing what I had thrown away.
We spent that night in a long list of unremarkable settings, saying very little to each other.
We have literally never been apart since that night. She runs her business out of my office, we split time between her house in the city and my ranch in the foothills of the rocky mountains. We will continue this until her youngest finishes school.
Her laugh and her smile are the same. She still sees the man in me I never thought I could be. The world has shifted on it's axis and turns only for us and her boys now. The confidence we have found within each other has benefited everyone around us.
Many songs have clear, intended meanings. Sometimes they also have meanings, equally valid, that only resonate with one or two people. Who is to say they are wrong. I live in a different universe with the only person I was ever meant to be with, in large part because of an impromptu performance of this song.
How can my interpretation be wrong, even if only one other person knows what that is?
Even the use of punctuation in the lyrics is perfect.
The first chorus says "And now my bitter hands chafe beneath the clouds of 'what was everything?'" The use of a question in this case helps express the painful confusion you feel immediately after the event. In the second chorus, the line changes to "And now my bitter hands cradle broken glass of what was everything." Period - it was everything and now its over definitively. Brilliant lyrics.
This song is great live though, with the tags and all... I love when Eddie tags We Belong Together, and the Come As You Are/Every Breath You Take tag from Boston '94 right after Kurt Cobain died was awesomely intense.
Anyone else ever notice that Vedder skrews up the unplugged lyrics?
So yeah you guys should go troll the STP lyric page for Even Flow :P
Shake beneath the clouds