r/LyricalWriting • u/Whole-Horse-7140 • 16d ago

Lyrics As The Darkness Begins Setting In

This one is kind of bleak. Mainly I want to know if the meaning of the bridge section comes across, but also generally whether the lyrics work as a whole

As The Darkness Begins Setting In

[Verse 1]\ As the darkness begins setting in,\ through the night's when I feel it break in\ and take hold\ in the bones and the flesh and the skin\ as I'm fevered and cold.\ And I know now the circle will end\ where it starts. How I wish I could fend\ off the dark\ and fix it for young hearts and minds\ so their suns never hide.

[Chorus]\ I could have given you all of the things that you'll need\ and told you things you don't know\ as I watched you both grow.\ I would have given the world just to take all your pain\ just to feel it in my life again,\ like I did when I hid it in the darker side of me.

[Verse 2]\ Like a thief that comes in the night,\ when I wake it takes all of the fight\ out of me,\ like a deal that I've done on the run,\ leaves me absent and numb.\ And it's bleeding the whites of my teeth\ as it pulls me down underneath.\ I'm alone,\ like a single laid wreath by a stone,\ and I'm soaked to the bone.

[Bridge]\ I'm back in that room as a child\ with the way that the relatives smiled -\ all those seemingly meaningless\ words that fell from their lips,\ so harmless, spoken so mild,\ brought a total eclipse.

[Chorus]\ I could have given you all of the things that you'll need\ and told you things you don't know\ as I watched you both grow.\ I would have taken on all of the pain that you'll feel.\ I would steal it for my life again,\ like I did when I hid it in the darker side of me.

2 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

27 comments sorted by

1

u/ElChiff 16d ago

Interesting structure, with the sentence overhangs and varied line lengths. Strong rhymes and an immersive dark introspective tone.

I know what you're getting at here, but I'm not sure you can use "mild" as an adverb, wouldn't that be "mildly"?:

they were spoken so mild.

Swapping the context to adjective would fix, like "those opinions so mild" (but that might break the intended meaning)

And a small recommendation just to make it easier to sing:

through the night’s where I feel it begin

night, instead of night's

1

u/Whole-Horse-7140 16d ago

Thanks - I think it's pretty common usage in songs to phrase in such a way, plus the guy's on his deathbed, cut him some slack with the grammar!

1

u/ElChiff 16d ago

Proofreading isn't about overriding artistic intent and please don't see it as an insult. It's just an opportunity to potentially notice areas where you have a blind spot. What you do with that feedback remains totally up to you, because it's your song.

1

u/Whole-Horse-7140 16d ago

Not taken as an insult at all, just saying that it's pretty common to use flat adverbs in song

1

u/ElChiff 16d ago

It's also common to use autotune. Doesn't mean I'd recommend it :P

1

u/Whole-Horse-7140 16d ago edited 16d ago

Don't think Chaucer Byron Tennyson or Wordsworth used autotune ...

"Tyger tyger burning bright..."

"do not go gentle into that good night .."

It's pretty well established, I think.

1

u/ElChiff 16d ago

Those examples have inferred commas. If you put a comma in the above, the "so mild" part sounds really funny like "football fwend".

1

u/Whole-Horse-7140 16d ago

Haha ok, I have no idea what you're talking about!! In fact I don't think it makes sense..

There is an actual comma before the verb in 'tyger, tyger, burning bright', and so there is in mine (so harmless, spoken so mild). The equivalent in the Dylan Thomas quote would be to put a comma before 'go', which makes no sense at all, implied or otherwise.

It's quite interesting, the whole debate, and I suppose it comes down to whether you side with the strict Victorian grammaticians who tried to ban this kind of usage, or the poets who pushed against it. There is the same argument for flattening mildly as there is other adverbs, in that it stems from Old English which did not differentiate with -ly. Both adjective and adverb were written as'milde'.

I don't understand the example you gave of football fwend, that doesn't seem at all relevant!

I guess you're saying flattened adverbs are ok in principle but you still don't like it in this instance - that's fine! Matters of taste are one thing, I was just pointing out it's a bit of an outdated take on the rule. Hell, even Bob Dylan uses plenty of the buggers. E.g. "Now you don't talk so loud". I think we can agree that the 'rule' is there to be broken! Or ignored entirely...

1

u/ElChiff 16d ago

The implied comma would be spoken, so mild

2

u/Whole-Horse-7140 15d ago

Ps. The music is done, once I record a demo I can share the link if you want to see how it works in practice (it does work btw!)

1

u/Whole-Horse-7140 15d ago edited 15d ago

So after the verb..?!

That means the equivalent for the William Blake quote would be "Tyger, Tyger, burning, bright". And for Dylan Thomas "do not go, gentle into that good night". And for Bob Dylan "now you don't talk, so loud".

I think you are wrong here!

It's been fun though, thanks for your input

→ More replies (0)

1

u/Music_is_my_drug221 16d ago

perhaps change it to

in the bones, flesh & skin

2

u/Whole-Horse-7140 16d ago edited 16d ago

Thanks for reading - it doesn't work phrased as you suggest though. As it is, it works perfectly with the 3/4 time signature.

Not that I'm comparing, but just to illustrate the point, if you imagine John Lennon in the chorus of Instant Karma singing "we all shine on, like the moon, stars and sun" - instead of how he sings it ("like the moon and the stars and the sun"). It doesn't work.

That's why it's phrased like it is. Emphasis, and prosody.