The Civil Wars: Poison & Wine Meaning
Poison & Wine Lyrics
I know everything you don't want me to
Oh your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine
You think your dreams are the same as mine
Oh I don't love you, but I always will
Oh I don't love you, but I always will
Oh...
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1TOP RATED
#1 top rated interpretation:1. "You only know what I want you to
2. I know everything you don't want me to"
1. He's saying that she only knows what he tells her and/or from what she sees.
2. When in reality, she isn't that naive and she finds out everything she doesn't want to know that hurts her; and everything he thinks he's hiding.
3. "Oh your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine
4. You think your dreams are the same as mine"
3. Their lips are poison but at the same time it nourishes both of them. It's like having an addiction to something that is harmful to your health: it's bad for you, but you just can't stop.
4. As for the dreams being the same, she is saying that he thinks she doesn't have her own dreams. He thinks she is lost in him because she loves him so much that he IS her dream come true. But really, she has dreams of her own but sacrifices those for him because when you love someone you'd give up the world to be with them. She's not as weak as he thinks she is.
5. "I wish you'd hold me when I turn my back
6. The less I give the more I get back"
5. She wishes that when she acts like she doesn't care or that she's going to end the relationship and leave that he would chase after her. She wants him to prove that she's not holding on to nothing and that he will fight for her and their love.
6. He knows she is doing this and he doesn't react to it because he thinks she will always be there for him. He knows that she will always hold on to their love no matter what happens. The less he gives her and pulls away, the harder she fights to keep it together. Which in the end means he is always the one being pleased and always getting what he wants because of it. She wants to make him happy so he'll stay.
7. "Oh your hands can heal, your hands can bruise
8. I don't have a choice but I'd still choose you"
7. She's saying that when he hurts her he always comes back and fixes it; He heals the emotional wounds he caused. But just as much as he can heal her and save her from the pain, he also is the one that causes it. Therefore, he heals and bruises.
8. You cannot control your heart and who it decides to love. He's saying that even if he had the choice to pick anyone in the world to love, he would still choose her regardless of everything they go through.
9. "Oh, I don't love you, but I always will"
9. I saved this for last because I believe this lyric is the full meaning of the song. As much as they do not want to love each other, they can't help but do the complete opposite. They are forever ambivalent in their love with one another. They are unable to live without one another, but staying together is too painful; As much as they hate each other, they love each other that much more. It's an addicting type of love that they are unable to control. He manipulates her because he can and she deals with it because as hard as it is to be with him, it'd be even harder to be without. -
2TOP RATED
#2 top rated interpretation:To me this song represents a truly deep soul connecting love. It breathes with intensity the push and pull of a great love. I've only had it once it my life, but this song truly represents the complexities and simplicities of two lovers who don't want to admit to each other how deeply and strongly they truly are connected. They both know it, they both hide from it, they both know the other could absolutely kill and crush their heart. They dance back and forth, each knowing, each feeling the other's constant vibration within themselves and although at times the intensity is too much, they just can't break it...they have no choice in the matter. The love is meant to be.
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3TOP RATED
#3 top rated interpretation:I believe this song expresses the confusion of love in a unique, deeply tied relationship between a man and woman. They both cannot live without eachother, yet a barrier stands in the way of a perfect relationship. Their intense feelings for one another are mutual, yet both hide how truly of a deep connection is felt. Both with knowledge of how easily one will hurt the other, submission stays underneath, therefore causing reluctance to admit their true love for the other.
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This song is clearly about a twin flame relationship. The classic twin flame relationship is a deep soul connection as they are both one soul in two bodies that are mirrors for each other.
Their purpose is one teaches love and the other teaches self love in the other. The love is intense and like nothing other but it's also very painful. There is always a runner and a chaser. "I wish you'd hold me when I turn my back." When the divine feminine leaves, she wishes her divine masculine would chase her. She is always chasing him but he is always running away. He responds "the less I give, the more I get back." Because when he runs, she chases him because she has an unwavering loyalty and undying love for her twin. When one pushes the other pulls.
"Your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine"... the wine is the intense love they have together, but because the divine masculine can't accept her love and pushes it away, he ends up hurting her every time he runs (the poison). "Your hands can heal, your hands can bruise"...the same person who hurts her, heals her. Not in the sense of he is physically hitting her, but metaphorically every time he pushes her away, and then opens his arms to let her in again.
"I don't love you but I always will"... Often times the divine masculine will choose his karmic because it's comfortable and the love is not intense like with his twin. He has a hard time accepting such an intense love so he settles for less. The divine feminine will choose to finally put herself first (self love) instead of him, and eventually move on to be with a soul mate who is not a twin flame. It doesn't matter who they are with, they will always love each other, they cannot help it. They may want to move on, get over it and say "I don't love you anymore" but they still do and "always will".
"I don't have a choice but I'd still choose you." Their love and connection really feels out of their control. But still, they are each other's wish fulfillment. They are end game. Eventually they will be able to be together but it may take many lifetimes to get there. So despite the pain of their relationship, they will always find each other again and choose one another all over again.
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Most touching song ever......
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I think this is about people who love each other but they can't be together. the feeling is mutual but they will just hurt each other if they go together
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It's about two people who absolutely love each but just can't be together. They are soul mates but there is two much baggage to make it work. They love each other deeply but both have been hurt tremendously by one another, in different ways. They don't want to love the other but they realize they do and always will and just have to accept it and move on.
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To me, it talks about a deep connection of love. To me it's about having ups and downs, good and bad but making it work with each other. I picture a husband's wife dying of cancer and he wants to spend as much time as he can so they re-live the moments, the memories that they had and develop new ones along the way. Their love is so strong they realize they were meant to be together... This is what it means to me... I'm a rising choreographer and i wanted to choreograph a meaningful piece for a boy/girl dance....
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They love each other, but don't want to. Maybe one hurt the other, and the other is hurt and upset, but will always love the person, no matter what. You don't have to like them if you truly love them.
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i think two people loves each other but it's not a deep love and if it might be they don't understand each other.
in fact this song wants to show how people can love or hate each other but in both situations not deaply. -
This is from their website.
"Poison & Wine" fits the paradigm of subject matter too true to be spoken, as opposed to sung. "That song probably does sum us up—The Civil Wars, the name of the band—as well as any song that we've written," White says. It's the one song on the album written with an outside collaborator, their friend Chris Lindsey. "We're all married, and we were all talking about the good, the bad and the ugly, and just felt like: What would you say to someone if you were actually brutally honest—the things that you could never say because it would turn them away or let the cat out of the bag or reveal yourself to be weaker? What would you actually say if you had this invisible curtain around you and could just scream it in somebody's face and they'd actually never hear it? We were all being very painfully honest, because we're all very comfortable around each other and know that things like that never leave the room, except in a song. I'm pretty proud of that song, to be honest." -
It's a song of contradictions. It's lovely and creative.
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I think the song is about two people who are in love, but fight all the time. Yet they can't live without each other and they both know that. They might hit each other, walk away from the other, but something inside them says there is no one else that will make them feel the way they did when they were together.
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I think it's about 2 people who still love each other but don't want to, yet can't help themselves. Considering the "opposites" with each line such as "Your mouth is Poison, your mouth is wine." Poison is deadly so interpreting that would be something like Words you say can hurt or even kill. "Your mouth is wine," on the other hand is like sweet meaning the things you say show me you care. "Your hands can heal, Your hands can bruise" to me, means you love me in your way, yet you hurt me though you don't mean to. "You only know what I want you to" vs. "I know everything you don't want me to." They obviously are opposites and cancel each other out same with the line "I don't love you, but I always will." To me, that line means I don't want to love you, but I can never stop even if I tried. perhaps it makes sense to me this way because it's something I've experienced myself: dating someone who obviously loves you and you love him, but he hurts you even though he doesn't mean to and is generally sorry, and you do the same to him. You'll always love that person (which is the wine), but for the sake of loving that person and wanting to do right by them, you feel you shouldn't love them at all (which is the poison).
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My interpretation is that this song shows the longevity of a romanitc relationship, they have their ups and downs. They see the good and bad of each other, the intoxicating desire and also the power the other holds with the ability to destroy not only the other person but themselves if they ever broke the others heart. Its a true love full of risks and at time they don't feel like they love each other but then they remember their commitment to one another and will always love them.
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I think this song is about two people that are in love with each other but it's a love that's not meant to be, like something is blocking them from each other. Maybe one is in an unhappy marriage but is staying in the marriage because of kids or something but they love this other person...
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It's a song about two people who are together and were in love once, but not anymore. They are not completely honest with each other and the relationship suffers but they feel as though they don't have any other choice but to stay together. They no longer are in love but they still care for each other and love each other. It's a beautiful sad sad song.
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