Wake Up.

Arcade Fire - Wake Up

Something filled up
My heart with nothing
Someone told me not to cry

But now that I'm older
My heart's colder
And I can see that it's a lie

This part was so awesome in how it doesn't seem to make sense, at least not on the surface. He's older and his heart's colder (so well-put, really) but he realizes it's a lie - to not cry, that is. He realizes that there are things worth crying over, that it's a lie when people tell you to harden your heart and to bury things (which slowly eat you up, fact.) and to repress your emotions, and you slowly and inexorably become cold and unfeeling and emotionless. Don't believe them. Never never never never believe what they say. Never.

Children, wake up
Hold your mistake up
Before they turn the summer into dust

I think this is about how we shouldn't be afraid to make mistakes. To never let our fears govern us.

If the children don't grow up
Our bodies get bigger but our hearts get torn up
We're just a million little gods causing rainstorms
Turning every good thing to rust.

This part was just simply brilliant. The use of the simplest words here to paint pictures so breathtaking. What an amazing way to describe growing up - Our bodies get bigger but our hearts get torn up - and I choose to think of the second part as a picture of people all over the world crying. Goosebumps.

I guess we'll just have to adjust

I thought this was such a sad statement to describe the world as it is, that sooner or later all of us are going to have to adjust, to this grown-up world of indifference and hurt. And because I think that this song is essentially about growing up and lost innocence, that adjusting is such a sad way to describe growing up. Ohwell.

With my lightning bolts a-glowin'
I can see where I am going to be
When the reaper, he reaches and touches my hand

With my lightning bolts a-glowin'
I can see where I am going
With my lightning bolts a-glowin'
I can see where I am going

You better look out below!

I loved this part because of how childlike it is, what with the music and the lightning bolts. And the part about the reaper is such a poetic way to describe death isn't it. Somehow the lyrics harken back to the days of our childhood where we were allowed to dream of having superpowers like flying (on wings, or on winged shoes, or on thunderclouds, or on magic carpets, or) and being able to hurl lightning bolts and fire and ice etc etc.

So maybe it's a way of saying, be a child again, and "you can see where you are going" i.e. enlightenment or something along those lines.

My Body Is A Cage.

I know that one day I'll regret my lack of dancing bones and that one day I'll long to dance with the girl I love (with all my heart, both the longing and the loving) but that I'll be unable to cause I'm just so inadequate. And that my body will never be able to convey in its truest form, the expression of love I have so painstakingly conjured up in my mind. And that one day I will be so heartbroken cause I'll never be able to fully describe to the girl I love how much I love her, because of the limitations that our bodies, that words, language, impose upon us. And I think of how beautiful it would be if our minds could one day dance with each others', I think of our thoughts taking flight and interweaving in the most beautiful manner possible.

The Purple Turtle.

There was this turtle
He was purple
So he was, a purple turtle!

Purple turtle's name was Myrtle
At super slow speeds he could hurtle
But he was, no wartortle.

:(

_____

There is magic in the midnight sun
When the stars decline to glow

There is wonder in the parched ocean
Where the water never flows

There is beauty in the flightless bird
Whose wings refuse to grow

There is anguish in us mice and men
For love we do not know.


___________________________

His smile was torn
His soul was worn
All the pain that he had borne.
But what, truly, do we mourn
That on his sleeve was still adorn
His heart.

To The Laughing City.

Follow me now, to the laughing city! It is brilliant there! A brilliant facade. It is mesmerizing. We all look terribly happy there, we do! We really do.

We laugh for those who've lost their laughter. We laugh for those whom we've lost. We laugh for the dying, the sick, the poor (in spirit or otherwise), we laugh for those who laugh no longer.

For this is the laughing city.

There is a splendid painting we have there. Resplendent! It is of a woman bent over the body of her slain husband. Her face is a picture of anguish. We gaze upon it and we laugh! Ha ha ha!

There is more than a touch of madness in our proceedings. There is madness, and tears, in our laughing eyes. We shall speak of it no more.

Follow me now, to the laughing city! Ha ha ha.

The Invincibility Of Children.

How carefree life used to be. Reminiscing on the times back then, looking at secondary school kids just hanging around the park, a primary schoolkid walking to school. I remember back then, you didn't have to bother about anything other than yourself.

I don't mean being entirely selfish or self-centred or anything. It's how.. nothing seemed to affect you. The world of adults was extremely distant, possibly alien, to us back then. Money, work, stress, love even, never infringed upon our happy little worlds. I couldn't have given two hoots to the people I saw, JC kids, NSmen, working adults, whoever. My self-contained bubble was more than enough for me.

Those were the days you could walk home in the rain. You could jump into puddles and feel nothing but elation. You could lie down on a grass patch and even roll around. You could spend hours at a playground. You could get all grimy and slimy and seriously quite gross. You didn't have to worry.

You didn't worry about your clothesgetting wet, or dirty, or wtv nonsense little kids get up to. (Which is alot of nonsense, and of course, we didn't think we were little kids back then.) You didn't think you'd get all itchy and get rashes or sth when you took a rough and tumble on the grass or mud or sth.

Which is quite amazing actually. Somehow I never got a single grass rash or sth until I was much older. I think it's cause of that belief in your own invincibility you had when you were a kid. You never believed anything bad or harmful could every happen to you. I've always believed in belief, that it creates some sort of aura around you or sth.

Those were the days when all you had to do when you liked a girl was to, naturally, annoy the hell out of her as best as you can. And I was good. I shot rubber bands, shot paper pellets using rubber bands, and was generally a world class pest. She did like me back eventually. :)

Then you got older and became more aware of how you affect the people around you, and of how you've been affected by the world. And you lose that belief in your invincibility. And everything else goes tumbling after.