Everyone has a favorite song. One that keeps ringing in your head, one that you find yourself humming when you wake up or take a shower or feel happy or feel sad. One that seems to make perfect sense to you. One that you find yourself going back to, to help you through crisis. My favorite song is ‘November Rain’ by GNR. To say I love the song would be to put it very mildly. I love everything about the song; the beautiful lyrics, the unusual melody, the way it is crooned, the music arrangement, the emotions behind it, the video, the fact that it is by my favorite band, basically everything. But most of all I love the lyrics.
To me the song stays true to what it says in every way. That it is a lament of a kind, a sad love song about a man in love with a woman who is in love with his best friend. A song about a man who starts talking about how he loves this woman so much that even though he knows her loving him back is impossible he still looks for that little ray of hope in all the darkness. A song about a man who finally loses his woman to her own turmoil and suicide. The song is so cruelly sad, that it becomes strikingly beautiful. The way it unfolds is sheer poetry; the fact that it is centered around an inauspicious start because he is marrying someone not in love with him, ironically in November when the rain is considered acidic and not a good start for a life together, that he keeps saying that even November rain can’t last forever which subtly conveys his hope that bad times can’t stretch on forever. I love the way Slash is weaved in so ingeniously into the story, just giving one a glimpse of the whole complicated triangle, showing only snatches of what he is probably going through as well. The human emotions attached to this song; love, happiness, sadness, desperation, anguish, pain, betrayal, hope…it is all so artistically intertwined.
The lines that speak to me most about the song are, “And when your fears subside and shadows still remain. I know that you can love me, when there is no one left to blame”. These lines show love that is so unconditional, so unrestrained; a love that I wish I could experience. A man who is willing to wait around, who is so much in love that he doesn’t mind what’s happening, who is just around hoping to have her love him back. Is love like this possible?
So I close my eyes and hope that I will experience this sheer love one day. To be loved so much that they will wait, to be loved unrestrained, to be needed, to be wanted, to be loved unconditionally, to be loved without expectations, without boundaries. Who out there is lucky enough to be loved that way? Tell me your love story…
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