Sarah McLachlan Lyrics

Sarah McLachlan does not describe what her songs are about in most cases. She says that part of listening to a song and it's lyrics for many people is applying your own meaning, or figuring out what the song means to you. There are 2 songs from her last album, 'Afterglow', that I was listening to recently, and was re-struck by what they mean to me.

The first is a song called 'Answer', which to me is about selflessness... It makes me think of the relationship with a real life parter or with your child.

I will be the answer
At the end of the line
I will be there for you
While you take the time
In the burning of uncertainty
I will be your solid ground
I will hold the balance
If you can't look down

If it takes my whole life
I won't break, I won't bend
It will all be worth it
Worth it in the end

Cause I can only tell you what I know
That I need you in my life
When the stars have all gone out
You'll still be burning so bright

Cast me gently
Into morning
For the night has been unkind
Take me to a
Place so holy
That I can wash this from my mind
The memory of choosing not to fight

If it takes my whole life
I won't break, I won't bend
It will all be worth it
Worth it in the end
'Cause I can only tell you what I know
That I need you in my life
When the stars have all burned out
You'll still be burning so bright

Cast me gently
Into morning
For the night has been unkind

There's another song on the album called 'Drifting' which has also become particularly full of meaning to me in the last year and a half. Although she did not say what the song was about, she recently has had a child, and when I hear this song I think about waiting to meet mine.

You've been gone so long all that you know
has been shuffled aside as you bask in the glow
of the beautiful strangers who whisper your name
do they fill up the emptiness?

Larger than life is your fiction
In a universe made up of one
You have been drifting for so long
I know you don't want to come down
Somewhere below you, there's people who love you
And they're ready for you to come home
Please come home

You walk in a room and the world stops to stare
Mesmerize all who are caught in the glare
Of the spotlight that follows wherever you go
Does it light up the emptiness?

Larger than life is your fiction
In a universe made up of one
You have been drifting for so long
I know you don't want to come down
Somewhere below you, there's people who love you
And they're ready for you to come home
Please come home