But what does it all mean?

When I set out to do this little lyrics analysis exercise, I didn’t quite know how I was going to handle it. I mean, there are songs that speak to me, but I’m not quite sure why they speak to me. So I’m just going to write this in stream of consciousness and see what happens.

1. The Beekeeper, Tori Amos

This is the most recent of the songs on my Top 10 list. I debated whether to include it because it’s so new. Certainly, there were older songs that had spoken to me for far longer, right? But this is one of those songs that sent chills down my spine the first time I heard it and really listened to the words.

The song is about a young woman going to see “The Beekeeper,” which is a non-traditional representation of God (a woman named Sophia). The woman is begging for the life of her mother: “I know you want my/you want my queen/Anything but this./Can you use me instead?”

I think it speaks to me on a couple of levels. First of all, the self-sacrifice and intercession is very central to my relationships. But I also feel this sort of attachment to the God figure: “I have come with my mustard seed/I cannot accept that she will be taken from me.” It’s the idea that, hey, God, I’ve done my part – are you even listening to me? And the answer isn’t the one she wants, so how is she going to handle that.

The deeper level of the song speaks to a huge amount of guilt I feel for the passing of my grandfathers in 1994 and 1998 – honestly, among the hardest things I’ve gone through in life. In the song, she says, “In your gown with your breathing mask on/plugged into a heart machine,/as if you ever needed one.” And here, within the span of three and a half years, I saw two of the strongest men in my life gone. One was struck down suddenly, without the slightest indication he was ill. The other developed Alzheimer’s and slowly became a shadow of his former self. And I wanted so badly to go to The Beekeeper and say, “Hey there, I’m not done with them yet. It’s not time. There are things left to say and places left to go.”

Okay. Moving on to the next song before I start crying.

2. Hold Me Now, The Polyphonic Spree

This is also a relatively new song, and possibly the most upbeat of those on my list. This one is unique in that not only the lyrics speak to me, but also the presentation. Polyphonic Spree is a (rather large, if I recall) group of people, so I interpret their style differently. When one person sings a song, I feel sort of an intimate one-on-one relationship with that song. In this case, when it’s sung by a choir, it takes on a larger purpose: Here’s your world speaking to you, and here’s what it has to say.

Here’s how I interpret the song: At the beginning, there’s a guy who thinks he’s got it all together, and he gets out in the world ... “and someone said with a cold hard chest/‘You’re a mess.’”

Well, it should be obvious why this speaks to me. I don’t feel sick. I don’t look sick. But my mind is going 90 miles an hour, and I don’t think that’s the way it’s supposed to be. And here I am trying so hard to reach a level of inner understanding (“your new age”), and I feel like the world perceives me as a mess – maybe because I really am, or maybe that’s just how their perception works. But that chorus, it’s like my mantra: “Hold me now/Don’t start shaking/You keep me safe/Don’t ever think you’re the only one when times are tough/In your new age.” Basically: Calm down, take a breath, remember what really matters and let that be your guide.

3. Hurt, Nine Inch Nails

When I was putting this list together, I went back and forth in my head 10 or 12 times: Should I include it? Does it make me sound totally insane? I think the deciding factor for putting it on my Top 10 list is that I have, like, eight versions of this song in different forms. I think that counts for something.

At first glance, Hurt is extraordinarily dark. Morbid. A little scary, if you’re easily scared. :) But I see this as a song about a guy who’s made some tough choices – right or wrong, they’ve hurt somebody he loves. Here are all these painful memories (“I focus on the pain/The only thing that’s real”) and that old familiar feeling he gets when he thinks about the past. The other line that really speaks to me is “You could have it all/my empire of dirt/I will let you down/I will make you hurt.” He’s hurt somebody for self-gain, and now he’s realizing his empire is ... just a mound of dirt. It means nothing because he’s alone, he’s let her down, he’s made her hurt.

So what does this have to do with me? I’ve thought a lot about it, because I certainly don’t feel like I’ve been in the situation where I’ve hurt somebody for self-gain, or have been hurt by somebody for their gain. But I think it’s the realization that everything I have, it’s nothing if I don’t have the people I love in life.

The last verse also holds great meaning for me. “If I could start again/a million miles away/I would keep myself/I would find a way.” It’s a nice thought: Getting to start over, getting to relive your life so you don’t make the same mistakes. But you look at that last line and realize he’s not sure how he would fix his life, the choices he’d change. I’d find a way to not be in this situation mentally ... but how? I don’t know how I got here, so how am I supposed to know what to change?

4. Little Earthquakes, Tori Amos

Ah, the second Tori song. I honestly think I could have made my list totally of Tori and Ani songs (Tori because she explores themes and thoughts near and dear to me; Ani because she makes me feel empowered, as if I can change the things that keep me down.)

This song is, on the simplest terms, about those little things that break a person up inside. At first glance, I thought the song was referring to relationships: “Doesn’t take much to rip us into pieces.” But the line, “I can’t reach you/I can’t reach you,” says to me, Hey, I’m changing. And suddenly it’s not so easy to connect with you on the level I once did.

I read this song purely from a mental standpoint. Here I am, scared by little things (going out with my family? Driving to work?) and I feel very threatened by it. I feel like I’m ripping into pieces. And I know that’s affecting my relationships, that I can’t reach people I once did because I’m wrapped up in my own fears. Particularly poignant are the lines, “And I hate disintegration/watching us wither/Black-winged roses that safely changed their color.” I feel like I’m withering, wondering why I can’t be like others (the “black-winged roses”) who roll with the punches and change with the times.

5. My IQ, Ani DiFranco

If you’ve heard this, it sticks with you forever. One of Ani’s spoken word pieces, and a beautiful one at that. This is one of the songs that I love because it doesn’t explain where I’ve been. Instead, it’s a map of where I’m going, who I’m becoming,

I don’t think a lot of explanation needs to go into this song, because it’s so ... self-explanatory. Girl meets world. World lays down rules. Girl shuns rules and learns to play on her own terms.

One reason this song is so important to me is because of the people in my life related to this song. There was Juliet. Quiet, mousy Juliet who missed her Grandmama’s Mexican food. Understanding, studious Juliet who alternated between amazing concertinas and ... Ani. Then there was Lynne, who has apparently fallen off the face of the earth. Lynne, the wiccan lesbian editor who knew how to make me laugh, patiently answered a million questions, and introduced me to her techie cartoonist friends. I remember walking in the door one night – a rough night at that – and saying, “When I was four years old, they tried to test my IQ.” And she jumped in, “They showed me a picture of three oranges and a pear.” We finished the whole thing. We got some pretty crazy looks.

Beyond having ties to some very fond memories, this is really becoming a mission statement of sorts for me. “For every lie I unlearn, I learn something new.” I mean, if you could boil down into a minute and a half where I’d like my life to go from here, I think this would sum it up fairly well.

6. Never Thought, Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers

I think it was one of those nights during the autumn before The Summer From Hell. Matt – my writer-musician-college dropout buddy – and I would leave my office late, like after midnight, and drive around with nowhere to go and plenty to talk about. I’m very lucky that Paul trusts me, because people around the office started to talk. But there wasn’t ever anything there. He was my sounding board, and I was his, too, I guess.

Anyway, of all the songs Matt ever recommended, this one really hit home. That autumn, the one before The Summer From Hell, things were already headed south. At that time, the line that meant something was “So will I suffer?/Or will I be alright?/I look up into the stars/Then look down to count my scars/And I know mercy.” Man, I felt like it couldn’t get much worse, that I’d found some mercy between spending time with Paul and talking to Matt. (Little did I know ...)

Now, several years later, the song talks to me in a totally different way. There are very literal lines for me, such as “I dream in color/I live in black and white. ...” Another one is, “I was looking for clues inside these deja vus/and now I’m lost again/Looking for ways around the cliches/But I found I’m caught again.” To me, this says, I’m looking inside, and it’s just muddling things up. The annoying thing about this song is that it’s right on target, but there’s no resolution, no happily ever after. And for a song that fits so perfectly, I’d like to know things are going to turn out okay.