Musical Musings

[forsyth]

You know, I like Natalie Merchant's songs, for the most part. She has a really good voice, and I like the sound, usually. But there's one where the lyrics puzzle me. I still like the song, but the lyrics just trip me with a "huh?" reaction. At least part of them. Some of the other bits are parts I wish I'd thought of first or could steal for something else. The song's Wonder, and the lyrics that trip me up are the chorus.

They say I must be one of the wonders
Of God's own creation
And they smile as they can see they can offer
No explanation

There's two parts of this that confuse me. The first is the "...wonders of God's own creation..." part. From the theme of the song, I'd kinda figure, y'know, everything's God's own creation, what with the whole making the world in seven days bit. But that's really just a minor logical inconsistency with implied metaphysics, not really something to pick at. (Though it gave me an idea for something else to discuss later.)

It's the second stanza which confuses me. (And my interpretation could be wrong, some of the sites I saw read it as ...and as far as they can see..., which changes the meaning a bit, but most of my points stand.) Okay. So. This is something that's not just confined to this song, it's a much more widespread thing. People who see understanding things as bad. I don't get that. At all. The smiling when unable to explain part rings exceptionally false, but may be misheard. Why is being unable to explain something good, or desirable? And part of the other lyrics, yeah, the media can make things really banal, but again, asking questions isn't going to steal the glory of her story.

I still like the song, mind you. But I don't understand it. I like it like I like something from a totally alien culture. There's assumptions there on a base level I just don't share.

Comments

[dirkdada.livejournal.com]

hmm, i read the rest of the lyrics to the song. looking at it as a whole, it seems to me at least that the song is about a baby born with something medically...different about her. I think the implication is that it's not good.

So, she's one of God's wonders of creation. But she's flawed in such a way that people are uncomfortable to see her, that doctors will fly in from around the world just to observe her.

Why would God choose to allow something like that to happen to a child?

And all they can say is god works in mysterious ways, and smile uncomfortably.

my take, anyway. it's not that "not knowing" is a happy thing. It's just an existential question that has no answer this side of the grave.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

Hmm. It seems you're on to something. It looks like it might be about a kid with Down's Syndrome, at least according to this, and some other things google's turned up now. Apparently they're in the video for it.

Huh.

That puts a completely different spin on it, looked at it in that light. Though that's not the only way it can be interpreted. But interpreting it the way I was didn't really jibe with any of the rest of her stuff, either solo or with 10K Maniacs. I think both ways of looking at it work, though.

[gwalla.livejournal.com]

I always heard it as "And as far as they see they cannot find no explanation"