Rock in This Pocket

The song is subtitled "Song of David," which re-enforces the clear reference in the lyrics to the story of David and Goliath. But it also implies the song is a psalm, as many of the original Psalms are titles "Mizmor L'David," or "A Song of David." Many of the Psalms are about strife and a desire to vanquish one's enemies.

Vega begins her radically different sonic approach with a new production staff-- notably Los Lobos' guitarist David Hidalgo and the production team of Tchad Blake and (her later husband, and still later ex-husband) Mitchell Froom. The freewheeling nature of the album is alluded to by the liner notes and photos, designed to look like an old-fashioned traveling circus and its playbill.

The album starts with this song's clanging, swooping introductory sound, and the sarcastic "ahem" of its opening line: "Excuse me, if I may/ Turn your attention my way." This is both David, cockily threatening the giant Goliath... and Vega, re-announcing her presence on the cultural stage.

"I won't plead," she says, for the listener's attention. But she also insists that she have it: "It's what I need... If it's the last thing I do/ I'll make you see."

The David vs. Goliath story, of course, is the ultimate underdog narrative, the small defeating the much larger. Even the weapon itself-- a rock-- is small.

But before even discussing that, the speaker admits that the attention she seeks "isn't much" itself. However, the importance of the attention is larger than its size: "What's so small to you/ Is so large to me." Whatever it is that she has to say (probably everything that follows on the album) is important for her to say... and so you will listen, even if you don't think you care.

Yes, it's true that her opponent can cast a huge shadow-- "You darken my sun"-- but he should know that she must not be underestimated: "The rock in this pocket/ Could cause your fall."

The speaker's willingness to attack is so great, she is even willing to endanger her own life to do it: "I might be out like a light, extinguished in the throw."

But she feels it is worth it, because she will "hit [her] mark," since she is "well acquainted" with her target, "the span of [Goliath's] brow."

And in hitting her mark, she will make her mark in history. Her Goliath will "know." Yes, "If you didn't know me then, you'll know me now."

This seems to be Vega speaking. Her voice has been criticized as thin and wispy, "small," if you will. Her sound to date has been acoustic, ethereal, and sparse, also "small," compared to the sound of a blaring rock band or a dense dance track.

But she dismisses those concerns. Inspired by the DJs who have been reworking her "Tom's Diner" vocals, she creates a new, industrialized, citified sound for her fourth album. Even if her voice is still thin, her music demands to be noticed.

Mostly, I think, it is another "secret weapon" she is unleashing: Her ideas. The "rock in this pocket" could be an oblique reference to rock 'n' roll ("You see me as a folksy singer-songwriter, but guess what, I'm a rock star"). But more likely it is simply an unseen entity-- a thought-- that demands attention, smashes the competition, and slays the critics.

This is Vega's version of trash talk. In a way (an intellectual, literate way), it is as blustery as any rap boast. The remainder of her career, and the sphere of her influence, have borne out her boast. She'll "make you see" her, indeed.

Next Song: Blood Makes Noise

Pilgrimage

This song is about entropy-- or, as it applies to human life-- mortality. So why is the title about a spiritual journey to a holy place?

Let's start with a simpler question: What does the first line of the song mean? "This line is burning..." What line?

She means the line of the song, the line of music, the words she is singing themselves. The words and notes live on the ear for a fraction of a second apiece before dispersing into scattered waves.

Similarly, once a moment in time has passed, it may as well be ash. Its potential has been burned up like a spent matchstick, a used wick, or a piece of kindling. She begins this thought by mentioning the days of the week, and the words "months" and "year."

The next thought concludes logically: "This life is burning." Time started before we were born and will continue after we die. We are here for a few moments, relatively speaking (if the Earth's history were one year, all of human existence would take place in the last hour of December 31). So if time is being burned up, so is our lifetime.

But she holds out a note of hope. Yes, "every death is an end," but for all this "stopping," there is also "starting," or new birth. This is a "march over millions of years," and each generation takes its steps in turn.

All of this progress is pointing where, though? Here is all this "travel." Where is the destination, the "arrival"? The progression is, she says, "toward a source." So... Heaven? It would explain the title-- all of life is a pilgrimage back to the Heaven (which certainly counts as a holy place) from whence we came.

Then the speaker gets both more specific and more enigmatic about her destination: "I'm coming to you." To whom? God? A passed-on relative waiting in Heaven? (If so, this song might link to the previous one. That song was about a suicide attempt; perhaps the person tried to kill themselves to reunite with someone waiting in Heaven, and this song is from her perspective.)

The idea of "burning" and "turning to ash" is now applies to the land. The soil erodes, the continents rise and sink, and the whole Earth itself has a time limit due to the Sun's inevitable collapse.

The speaker closes with a parting gift: "Take this/ Mute mouth/ Broken tongue." The deceased is bequeathing her very silence as an inheritance. Why is silence a gift?

Death, which the speaker says she has been marching toward for years, has arrived. And now the "dark," painful-- perhaps physically so but certainly emotionally so-- life, has hope... the hope of an end.

"Now," that the pilgrimage has ended, the Promised Land of relief and release has been attained: "Now this dark life is shot through with light."

Many who have had near-death experiences speak of seeing a great light. But even without such a vision, the idea of life ending may not seem frightening to some. For those with "dark" lives, an end to such a life just means an end to the darkness, and so, light.

There is a movement now to take the idea of euthanasia a step further. Rather than it only being used to speed an inevitable death and avoid a protracted and agonizing decline, some would like a medically assisted suicide to be available to those with chronic pain, both of the physical and mental varieties. There are fates worse than death, a life of suffering may be one.

The speaker here has made grand claims about the entropy of the universe to rationalize her desire-- we're all dying all the time anyway, so what's the big deal? But really, she just wants to die so that the pain of missing her lost loved one can end.

There is a old comedy line: "If you can't live without me, why aren't you dead yet?" But the question is not funny, or rhetorical, to the speaker here. She would reply, "Give me a minute, I'm working on it."

Is the person making a pilgrimage to Heaven, or to the embrace of a lost loved one? For the speaker, those places are the same.


Next Song: Rock in this Pocket

Fifty-fifty Chance

The song is about a patient and the person visiting her (the speaker).

It starts with someone "lying in bed" in a hospital's cardiac ward. The doctor is explaining to the visitor that the patient has a "50-50" chance of survival.

The visitor, possibly the patient's adult child, sees "a pan on the floor/ Filled with something black." Her response is universal: "I need to know/ I'm afraid to ask" what it is.

The visitor then pledges her support to the patient, who is unresponsive. She could be sleeping or under sedation, but given the information we learn later, likely not in a coma.

"I hug you/ I hum to you... I touch you," says the visitor to the patient. "I tell you/ I love you./ Sing to you/ Bring to you/ Anything."

The visitor notes that that the patient, who should be calm since she is resting, has an accelerated heartbeat. Also, she is shivering: "Her body trembles with the effort to last."

The doctor seems satisfied, however, that the patient is over the worst of it. In fact, after one more night in the hospital, "She's going home/ Tomorrow at ten," meaning 10:00 a.m.

Then comes the chilling last lines: "The question is/ Will she try it again?"

And now we know why the patient was there: attempted suicide. The black material in the pan may have been whatever poison was pumped out of the patient's system.

In reality, a patient with only a "50-50 chance" of survival would not likely be sent home the next day, so the last verse could take place a week or two after the others.

There are two contrasts set up in this song. One is between a mind that wants to die being housed in a body that wants to live. The other is a person who wants to die when there is someone in her life who loves her so much.

If she is in the cardiac ward, this may be a clue as to why the patient attempted suicide in the first place. She may have a congenital or painful heart condition, and would rather die at her own hand than be the victim of a heart attack.

It is bad enough to take a patient home who may have a relapse of a disease or a recurrence of a cancer. It is something else entirely to know that a person might decide to try and take her own life again-- how could you possibly be vigilant enough? You have to sleep sometime...

There should be some staff person at the hospital, a social worker or psychiatrist, who can offer help and suggestions, and possibly even prescribe therapy, anti-depressants... something. Heck, the daughter might need some support, for herself.

To send a woman home with her suicidal mother, possibly the day after the attempt itself, with only a 50% chance of survival, and no psychological support? This does not sound like a doctor or hospital I would ever want to wind up with.


Next Song: Pilgrimage

Predictions

The desire to know the future is as old as the idea of tomorrow. The ancients warned that inquiring of oracles would inevitably lead one to misinterpretation in any case. And if one could speak the future plainly, like Cassandra, one would be ignored then, too. Their conclusion seems to be that you don't get to know what will happen until it does.

Here, Vega lists, somewhat exhaustively, the ways ancient (and, I suppose, some contemporary) people tried to suss out the future. She also does not speak of tarot cards, palm reading, Ouija boards, tea leaves, horoscopes, or crystal balls, but of more esoteric methods.

Many involve reading the behavior of animals-- "by mice," "by fishes," "birds." Fire-- from the flames themselves, to their "smoke," and even their "ashes"-- is another popular prognostication device. Water, from a "fountain," or its interaction with "hot wax," has been tried. As has light, often in reflection from a "mirror" or even "nails reflecting the rays of the Sun."

Natural objects, like "salt" and "pebbles drawn from a heap," have been consulted. Man-made objects, too, like a "suspended ring" or a "balanced hatchet," and even the rising "dough of cakes" have been investigated.

Human behavior is popular as well, from "walking in a circle," to simply "laughing," and of course "dreams." One's "features" can be read, so perhaps this is an allusion to palm reading, but more likely these features are facial.

But perhaps the largest category she lists is markings made by people. From "dots made at random," to the dots of "dice," or the "numbers" they represent. And "letters," too, and words, even whole "passages in books."

Do any of these methods... work? "One of these things will tell you something," she assumes.

A pattern emerges from these methods. A person must begin by saying "I will now set this random process in motion. Once it occurs, I will see how the elements are placed, and by their arrangement-- which I caused but did not control-- I will see what is to be."

It's a combination of intent and instigation by the clairvoyant on the one hand, and the random result of their action upon the object(s) in question on the other. Then the seer explains the result, to either the glee or chagrin of the client.

The interpretation, naturally, will differ depending on the "skills" of the soothsayer consulted, which may not only include the saying of sooth, but the reading of the client's body language, clothes, and political power.

The whole exercise is moot, of course. We cannot foretell the future, since no-one has won the lottery every month or even predicted the Super Bowl winner every time.

It's all about trying to find patterns in the randomness. The scattered ashes or salt grains stand for the randomness of human events and interactions. The prophet tries to see patterns-- mostly gathered from what the client has said while drinking his tea, not from the tea leaves left in the bottom of his cup after.

There are two problems with this. One is that events often are random, with no pattern. The other is that, to the extent that there are patterns to events, no two people will agree entirely on what they are.

This disagreement extends to events in the past, as well. No two historians, even reading over the same evidence, will come to the exact same conclusion. And police officers will tell you that there are as many opinions about a car accident that just happened as there are people at the scene.

It also is true that almost all of the cultures that used these methods are gone. For all of their supposed ability to foresee events, they did not see the plague, drought, volcano, or conquering force arriving from over the hill or ocean that was to eradicate their civilization.

"One of these things will tell you something"? They all will. And all of it worth "dots made at random on paper."


Next Song: Fifty-fifty Chance

Big Space

In glancing over the lyrics, I'm going to take a stab here and say that this song is about songwriting. Let's see if I'm right.

There is a metaphor of janitorial or maintenance work, perhaps for some sort of municipal job. We have words like "network," "fixing," "paperwork," "pipeline," "discipline," "weekend," and "swept up like garbage."

The idea of work pervades; the terms "network," and especially "paperwork" and "brain work" repeat several times throughout. Songwriting is not just a job, it's a grind. It's not just work, it's dirty work.

But how is any of this about songwriting, and not just about... work?

The song starts with a man telling our speaker to "stand in your own shoes" and to "look from your [own] direction."

The speaker responds that she'd "rather stand in someone else's." This is what John Keats called "negative capability," and what we today call empathy. Keats put it: "If a sparrow come before my window, I take part in its existence and pick about the gravel."

Seeing things from another's "perspective" is key to the poetic task. The dialogue continues that the two are "close to the middle" of something and "looking for a center," a unifying element between them that can allow them to communicate. But what if there isn't any, what if "it turns out to be hollow?" Well, then the act of looking itself becomes the solution, since "we" are doing that together; "We could be fixing what is broken."

Simply by her singing and her audience listening, an experience is being shared and a bridge is being built across the chasm between the two parties.

And now comes the chorus that says this is not just about series of forms being filled and filed. "Between the pen and the paperwork"-- in the space taken up by the ink forming the words, the "language" itself-- and "between the muscle and the brain"-- in that nerve, the "pipeline" that carries signals between the two...

...There must be "passion." There must be "feeling." Or else it is just "paperwork." It's not art without the passion and the feeling. It could be just "duty and... discipline." But she wants to go "beyond that."

Yes, but why is the metaphor not, say, working in a garden to produce flowers instead of vegetables? Or painting a portrait instead of a barn wall? Why use the metaphor of wires and pipes, of iron tools and aluminum filing cabinets, things that are colorless and lifeless?

Because not all songs are about love.

This one, for instance, is about "anger in a cold place." Maybe the man at the start is angry with her, frustrated at her always trying to see things from his side, from guessing his mindset and motives, from psychoanalyzing him. Instead of walking a mile in his shoes, as the cliche he quotes goes, she should "stand in [her] own shoes" for once, he tells her.

They are in a Catch-22. She feels that there is a gulf between them. She feels that she should be able to heal this rift if she can see things from his side of it. But it is this very pretentiousness that caused the problem to begin with! Her trying to see things from his side is his problem.

She intends it as empathy. He feels it as an invasion.

She has yet to sort this out. "All feelings fall into the big space"-- possibly the "hollow" between them-- and her method of dealing with "feeling" is to put it in a "pipeline." Maybe by writing about it, she can sort the pieces out.

Imagine a canyon. Throwing logs into it randomly is not going to create a bridge from one side to the other. Even if you fill it with haphazard logs, you still will not be able to get from one side to the other. One requires flat planks, lined up regularly-- some form of order-- a "network," a "pipeline"-- to create that bridge to carry feelings from her to him and back.

But there is a river in the canyon. Even the feelings that fall into this big space are "swept" away. In the municipal imagery of the song, "like garbage on the weekend." Instead of forming a line, they are brushed aside into the "avenues of angles."

So I'm wrong. The janitorial and bureaucratic imagery are metaphors for writing, but perhaps not songwriting. Maybe it's letter-writing between lovers. And it is so hard, it starts to feel like work.

She sees a problem, but she only has one tool to solve the problem-- her ability to assume another's perspective. She's going to empathize her way out of the problem she empathized her way into! That's like trying to dig out of a hole instead of climbing out, just because you have a shovel.

She should go back to her side. And instead of trying to guess what he's about, she should ask. And if he is not as voluble as her (he seems to lean on cliche), she should wait. And before she concludes that, yeah, fine, now she knows, she should make sure by asking again.

In trying to be both people in the relationship, she is making him feel left out. He keeps stepping back, once in a while dumping his feelings into the big-- and expanding-- gulf between them.

Unless she starts listening instead of talking for them both, the whole relationship is going to fall into the big space, and be swept away.


Next Song: Predictions

Room off the Street

There is Slavic proverb: "Eat bread and salt and speak the truth." To me, it means that both your intake and your output should be simple, direct, and decent. The quote comes up later in the song.

But it starts, like "Marlene on the Wall," with the image of a poster. This time, the poster shows "a man with his hand in a fist." We learn that the poster belongs to the resident of the "room" of which the wall is a part. And that, to this man, the poster is "his symbol of freedom/ It mean he has brothers who believes as he does." We are given to understand that he is a revolutionary of some stripe-- but whether anarchist, fascist, or what we are never told. 

In fact, this is all we really learn of the man. The main character, who is introduced first, is a woman. She is "in" the room, which we see is not necessarily hers (she is not "at home"). Her relationship to the room's resident is unclear. In fact, this ambiguity is the substance of the song.

Here is what we know of her-- she has been "drinking." She is wearing a very red dress that is "so tight/ You can see every breath that she takes." Neither of these factors-- her drinking nor her dress-- bespeak the kind of person who consorts with militant types.

Yet... "she is moved by the thing that she sees in his face/ When he talks of the cause." Perhaps she is drinking and partying because she is bored. She is aimless, and so captivated by this man who is so well-aimed. It doesn't matter if she believes in the cause, per se. She just wants to believe in something as much as he.

"She leans against him," because she is drawn to his passion. Because, while he speaks so articulately about his passion, she has nothing to talk about, and no way to express herself except physically. 

"They talk of the salt and the truth and the bread"-- the things he is interested in, and someone with a cocktail dress on her body and a cocktail in her hand is likely not.

It is somewhat clear that they do not have sex: "The night goes along/ The fan goes around." No mention of the bed. It seems that the cause is so fascinating to this rebel that he neglects to notice the tipsy, slinky woman pressed against him. And neglects to wonder what her... cause might be.

Evidently, they are being quite loud during all of this, as well. "Every sigh, every sway/ You can hear everything that they say." The song is titled "Room off the Street," so it seems they cannot only be heard from an adjoining apartment but from the street!

Something is going to happen between these two people. "Something's begun," some sort of relationship. It could be long and bad-- a "war." It could be long and good-- a "family" or "friendship." Or it could be short and good-- a "fast love affair."

Most likely, it is the lattermost. These two are not in it for the long haul. He will grow bored of her, of her lack of commitment to the cause, of her using him for his passion.

And she will grow tired of him, always caring more about the cause than her. Maybe he can eat bread and salt-- she will needs something more luxurious. Maybe he can speak the truth-- she needs innuendo and wit.

They will have a fling, then fling each other aside. He will find someone as dedicated to the cause as himself. And she will find someone wealthy enough to show her an endless good time.

For him, his party is his life. Meanwhile, she is the life of the party.

For him, life is a just cause. For her, life is... just 'cause.


Next Song: Big Space

Those Whole Girls

The key to this song-- more of a poem-- is the title.

"Those," as opposed to this girl, the speaker. How are they different? They are "whole."

There is something less than whole about the speaker, however. She has some disability-- physical, mental, emotional, some combination thereof-- that denies her the abilities and skills of the "whole" girls, which she then enumerates.

First, they "hurl... words," possibly at her. The direction in which they hurl them is key-- they don't just hurl them across or over, but "down," from a position of height (perhaps they are not in a bed or wheelchair) or at least a place of assumed superiority.

They can also move very freely. They "run," "spin," and "move." Presumably, our speaker finds these seemingly simple tasks either more challenging or simply impossible.

They also do not just run, but do so "in packs." First, their mobility allows them more ability to socialize. But they use this as a weapon, a tactic of war; the term "packs" refers to a group of wolves, who hunt in such coordinated units.

They have "bloom," or vitality. The word can also refer to their blossoming adulthood-- they may be more teens than "girls," or at least put on such airs.

Overall, the whole girls "know health." This is key-- it seems the speaker does not know health. She is not just sick now, but has been for a long time. So long, she does not remember how health feels anymore, if she ever did.

The whole girls use their health to their advantage. They "skim the cream," taking only the nicest parts of everything, the parts that rise to the top. They go to the best schools, the best parties, the best vacation locales, and they likely seize the best boys.

Moreover, the "fill the brim" and "feel no lack." Their cups, in short, runneth over.

Their social access allows them to have so much gossip they overflow with that, as well; they "drip with news."

The next line may be a pun. They "spin intact," so they may do spins as part of dances or figure skating and not feel dizzy afterward. But Vega's phrasing, with a pause between "in" and "tact," may be more than a nod to the three-syllable structure of the piece. They may "spin"-- as in what "spin doctors" do-- the news they drip with. But they do so with "tact" and charm learned from all the social interaction their health has afforded them.

The whole girls, the speaker continues, "blaze and stun." This could be a reference to their beauty, as in "she's a stunning woman."  But it can also be another reference to their viciousness; they may stun as in "stun gun." These are the same young women who can speak with "tact" one minute and "hurl down words" in another. It is not too much of a stretch to assume they can sling an insult at someone so underhandedly their target doesn't even know she's been attacked at first.

Overall, these girls are truly whole. They are sound in mind and body, they have access to the "cream" of what life has to offer, and in everything, they "feel no lack."

We learn four more things about them. One is that that they "breathe with ease." Perhaps this is a clue to what is less than whole about our speaker. She may have a pulmonary disease, or simply asthma. Alternately, she may have a social disorder that prevents her from "breathing easily" when around other people, as with agoraphobia or general anxiety disorder.

The whole girls, however, "need no mercy." The character of Henrick, from Sondheim's A Little Night Music, expresses well what being on the receiving end of compassion can feel like: "It's intolerable, being tolerated." If everyone is saying "poor you," you start to internalize the idea that, yes, you are pitiful.

The whole girls can get out in the sunshine. They can get up and turn on a lamp whenever they please. And so they "move in light" in a way others cannot, who must either live with the darkness or beg the "mercy" of others to flip the switch.

Lastly, the whole girls "run in grace." This could be another way of saying they are graceful, that they can be ballerinas and gymnasts while the not-whole girls can't.

But it could also mean something much sadder. It could mean that they run in Grace, as in the favor of God. And how unfair, that such ungrateful creatures could not only take their health for granted, but use it to lord over others, teasing and excluding them, as if health were a right and not a privilege.

Meanwhile, how might a disabled person feel? Made to suffer, for no reason, by an arbitrary or even malicious Deity?  How must it feel to suffer, and beyond that, feel one deserved this suffering? And if they did not deserve it, and God made them, why did He make them this way? Adding religion to the equation could bring in entirely new series of questions, pains, and doubts.

Vega imagines the way a disabled teen might look at her abled peers. Vega urges the listener to take a closer look at those less than whole girls, and boys, and try to make them feel more whole, and more a part of the whole.


Next Song: Room off the Street