Lightning

In 1986, composer Philip Glass wrote the music to an album's worth of songs by some of the best living lyricists: Paul Simon (1 song), David Byrne (2), Laurie Anderson (2)... and Suzanne Vega, then 27 years old, who wrote this song and the next we will discuss. The writers did not perform the songs; in this case, Janice Pendarvis sang it. The album was called Songs from Liquid Days.

Most likely, the song is not about lightning itself but some event with similar characteristics: sudden, unexpected, and devastating. The event happened "a while ago," but the effects are still being felt: "It's blazing much too fast... it's happening so quickly."

The imagery continues, implying that the bolt started a fire of sorts, "but give it rain of waiting time/ and it will surely pass, blow over." These last two words are meant in the sense of a passing storm, as in, "The scandal will blow over; we can run him again next election and no one will remember."

Well, the soothing rain of "waiting time" is not here now. Now we have "the flaming time." And she's still in the midst of the fire, "grop[ing] about the embers." She wants to "release [her] stormy mind," and discuss her emotions, but events are too turbulent just yet, and she has to focus. She repeats "blow over," this time in the sense of "The wind is so strong, I think the barn might blow over and collapse!"

The cataclysmic, lightning-like event has left her "Shaken... laughing and undone"... as well with a "sleeplessness" that's keeping her awake like "a blinding bolt." The laughing could be in genuine joy or disbelief.

So, that's rain's coming any minute, right, to cool things down? No, this has all "just begun," even though the lightning struck "a while ago." Maybe she was unable to process anything in the flash itself, but the blaze is now steady enough for her to begin to assess its effects.

As with any sudden event, there is a panic reaction: "...a windy, crazy running." Also, the lightning was so overwhelming, she barely has any recollection of the event itself, or the moments after; it's as if the lightning resulted in "time burned away."

The sensations have been building, now climaxing in an aftershock: "Now I feel it in my blood/ All hot and sharp and white/ With a whipcrack and a thunder/ And a flash of flooding light." The memory of the lightning strike is as real as the strike itself.

When the fire "finally dies," then "there'll be a think and smoky silence in the air," and the "ashes of the time burned away" we discussed earlier. And then we true effects will at last be known, especially, "Who'll be left there."

So... what was the "lightning"? Was it good or bad? Was this a sudden rush of love, a lottery win, receiving an international honor? Or was it more like a car crash, a divorce, an actual natural disaster?

We don't know, and it doesn't really matter. The sequence of events that takes place when any kind of "lightning" strikes is similar. In the split-second of the incident, we are shocked. When we look back, we forget what happened just after, as we were in a state of that shock.

Soon, we regain our senses, and realize that, as Stevie Nicks put it, "the rooms are all on fire." We are in emergency mode. We are flooded with emotions, but the need to respond snaps us into focus.

When we finally remove ourselves and think back to what we just underwent, the realization of its impact hits us like a second lightning bolt. We are finally safe enough to feel the emotions we experienced earlier.

And then things finally subside and return to somewhat-normal. So we look around, to see who make it through the fire with us. If all goes well, it's the people we were hoping would.

Next Song: Freezing