What we’ve got here is a song about wishing you could take on somebody else’s pain, only to realize that not only is pain a solipsistically personal thing, but that the particular person in pain possesses a vastness of strength and resolve accumulated over a life’s experience of weathering previous such ordeals. Being on the outside of pain is strange and disorienting, but it is also an experience in which one can recognize that even though a loved one’s experience pushes the boundaries of empathy, their truest and most admirable qualities are revealed in agonizingly human moments.
Instrumentally, this song was a lesson in letting go. While writing this song, I had some interesting and intricate clavichord parts from which all of my other ideas sprang. I was precious about them until it came time to mix the track, when I realized they had to go for the sake of the song. I miss their texture and their harmonies, but they crowded a song that simply needed to breathe. It’s better this way.
lyrics
Out in the clearing
On a moonless night
Keeping vigil
By a dim dim light
If a good woman’s
In a season of pain
A fortunate man
Will try to carry the same
I dirtied my hands Reaching into the Earth
A city of strangers
Aught to show you your worth
She drew an old line
Around the wind and the rain
An innocent moment
In a season of pain
Water is rising
What a serious stretch
And all the hairs standing
On the back of your neck
Asleep like an angel
With your demons about
Takes all that I got
Not to carry you out
Oh what I wouldn’t give
To be alone with you now
Standing moonless in the clearing
and you’re with me anyhow
She drew an old line
Around the wind and the rain
A veteran soldier
In a season of pain
A city with a curtain drawn
A city with a wall
A clearing with a fire burning
Go ahead, cleanse it all
She drew an old line
Around the wind and the rain
A point worth proving
In a season of pain