The song is about wanderlust... she is an explorer at heart, and she is dreaming. Not only is she dreaming of vast and incredible imaginations, but she's sharing the moment with her Love...
Sometimes life can become so predictable that it is tempting to take a jump from that little box, and it is fun to delve into the wideness of unknown depths. Joanna prizes that kind of exploratory spiritedness in her relationship. To sail away on a winter's day with fate as malleable as clay is to take a risk, not knowing where you'll end up, but jump out into the change... when everything stops for a while in the world, and the fireplaces are crackling, and people are huddling away from the bleakness and icy breezes, you are immersed in one of the most vivid and memorable parts of your life. It's one of those moments that the song catches.
Though the moment is sure to end, and you'll get back to life and the pattern of winter's days, it is so richly worth capturing while it lasts. The memory itself is a treasure, and the little snippet of time it fills gives value and depth to living. It is good to do life with your eyes open...
When she says "The sight of bridges and balloons/ Makes calm canaries irritable/ And they caw and claw all afternoon/ Catenaries and dirigibles", she's talking about that certain restlessness that makes her want to fly out there again. Can you imagine sitting on your lounge on the stillest afternoon, with the sun pouring in through the window and the clock ticking 'tick-tock-tick-tock' as time very slowly drips past, and the moments hang and merge together in the silence of the day's quiescent placidity? In the corner, a canary sits in a small antique cage, adorning the decor and complimenting the fine teacups sitting on the slightly dusty shelves. But for Joanna, an aura of adventure and open skies drops weightily on the moment makes her itch to get up and move. Birds have wings, and should be flying in worlds much larger than themselves...
So what does she do? What would you have done when you were, say, five? If it's too cold and you aren't allowed outside, you make your tents and cubby-houses, and suddenly the living room is transformed - say, a pirate ship? A cosy and mysterious tea-house on a faraway continent? Worlds of fields and forests to explore for secrets too tiny to see and too large to hold, but so real all the same? Imagination gives you your wings.
Though sometimes life does not let us go beyond its wallpaper and painted doors, there are worlds within the world so ready to explore. Doesn't matter if they're small, and their charm lasts just a moment. Doesn't matter if that world is across the chasm of decades. Doesn't matter if you know it's just a game. Because you know it's one of the realest parts of life. Your Love knows it too, and you can gallivant together till the sunset bids you goodnight beneath a twinkling universe... the moment is shared. Your schedule may have set your path as far as your eye can see... but stop for a moment... fill up just a thimble. Your heart does not have to be small for it to mean the world. Don't let the wisdom of years illuminate for you the smallness, and blind you to the potency and depth... wardrobes have in their time enclosed whole worlds, you must remember.
So when she says "Oh my Love/ Oh it was a funny little thing/ To be/ The ones/ To've seen", it is affectionately linking it back to the relationship, and her wonder at the moment she has shared with her Love. It's easy to go through life with your eyes closed... but being together, even in that moment indoors, has let them see glorious things - as if they'd never even seen the world before. They are explorers, beholding their treasure... it is their secret. "Why should it be us," she asks, "that get to run through untrodden shores while the world goes on?" It's quite amazing.
Very sweet really. I guess it can relate to many different facets of all sorts of relationships - the picture is malleable :-) I get the feeling this song is particularly romantic though... and I love how it mingles that with its innocent and childlike texture. It twinkles.
I adore this song. Aaaahhhhh... the sweetness, uniqueness and honey-rhythmed wildness of all its layers and all its intricacies open up a world of their own, and it makes me smile, and it makes calm canaries irritable...
I hope you're a writer of some sort. Thanks for your view, I'm always afraid my opinion of songs meanings are too shallow, Like I figured this song was mostly about lost dreams and lost lovers or something, and I hate to do artists injustice like that.
I hope you're a writer of some sort. Thanks for your view, I'm always afraid my opinion of songs meanings are too shallow, Like I figured this song was mostly about lost dreams and lost lovers or something, and I hate to do artists injustice like that.
The song is about wanderlust... she is an explorer at heart, and she is dreaming. Not only is she dreaming of vast and incredible imaginations, but she's sharing the moment with her Love...
Sometimes life can become so predictable that it is tempting to take a jump from that little box, and it is fun to delve into the wideness of unknown depths. Joanna prizes that kind of exploratory spiritedness in her relationship. To sail away on a winter's day with fate as malleable as clay is to take a risk, not knowing where you'll end up, but jump out into the change... when everything stops for a while in the world, and the fireplaces are crackling, and people are huddling away from the bleakness and icy breezes, you are immersed in one of the most vivid and memorable parts of your life. It's one of those moments that the song catches.
Though the moment is sure to end, and you'll get back to life and the pattern of winter's days, it is so richly worth capturing while it lasts. The memory itself is a treasure, and the little snippet of time it fills gives value and depth to living. It is good to do life with your eyes open...
When she says "The sight of bridges and balloons/ Makes calm canaries irritable/ And they caw and claw all afternoon/ Catenaries and dirigibles", she's talking about that certain restlessness that makes her want to fly out there again. Can you imagine sitting on your lounge on the stillest afternoon, with the sun pouring in through the window and the clock ticking 'tick-tock-tick-tock' as time very slowly drips past, and the moments hang and merge together in the silence of the day's quiescent placidity? In the corner, a canary sits in a small antique cage, adorning the decor and complimenting the fine teacups sitting on the slightly dusty shelves. But for Joanna, an aura of adventure and open skies drops weightily on the moment makes her itch to get up and move. Birds have wings, and should be flying in worlds much larger than themselves...
So what does she do? What would you have done when you were, say, five? If it's too cold and you aren't allowed outside, you make your tents and cubby-houses, and suddenly the living room is transformed - say, a pirate ship? A cosy and mysterious tea-house on a faraway continent? Worlds of fields and forests to explore for secrets too tiny to see and too large to hold, but so real all the same? Imagination gives you your wings.
Though sometimes life does not let us go beyond its wallpaper and painted doors, there are worlds within the world so ready to explore. Doesn't matter if they're small, and their charm lasts just a moment. Doesn't matter if that world is across the chasm of decades. Doesn't matter if you know it's just a game. Because you know it's one of the realest parts of life. Your Love knows it too, and you can gallivant together till the sunset bids you goodnight beneath a twinkling universe... the moment is shared. Your schedule may have set your path as far as your eye can see... but stop for a moment... fill up just a thimble. Your heart does not have to be small for it to mean the world. Don't let the wisdom of years illuminate for you the smallness, and blind you to the potency and depth... wardrobes have in their time enclosed whole worlds, you must remember.
So when she says "Oh my Love/ Oh it was a funny little thing/ To be/ The ones/ To've seen", it is affectionately linking it back to the relationship, and her wonder at the moment she has shared with her Love. It's easy to go through life with your eyes closed... but being together, even in that moment indoors, has let them see glorious things - as if they'd never even seen the world before. They are explorers, beholding their treasure... it is their secret. "Why should it be us," she asks, "that get to run through untrodden shores while the world goes on?" It's quite amazing.
Very sweet really. I guess it can relate to many different facets of all sorts of relationships - the picture is malleable :-) I get the feeling this song is particularly romantic though... and I love how it mingles that with its innocent and childlike texture. It twinkles.
I adore this song. Aaaahhhhh... the sweetness, uniqueness and honey-rhythmed wildness of all its layers and all its intricacies open up a world of their own, and it makes me smile, and it makes calm canaries irritable...
Jesus, this is brilliant. Not the song (though the song IS very good), but your analysis.
Jesus, this is brilliant. Not the song (though the song IS very good), but your analysis.
I hope you're a writer of some sort. Thanks for your view, I'm always afraid my opinion of songs meanings are too shallow, Like I figured this song was mostly about lost dreams and lost lovers or something, and I hate to do artists injustice like that.
I hope you're a writer of some sort. Thanks for your view, I'm always afraid my opinion of songs meanings are too shallow, Like I figured this song was mostly about lost dreams and lost lovers or something, and I hate to do artists injustice like that.
@Annelise I just read this and it made me cry. Your analysis is so beautiful and captures the true essence of the song... of life.. Thank you.
@Annelise I just read this and it made me cry. Your analysis is so beautiful and captures the true essence of the song... of life.. Thank you.