When a relationship ends, it can feel like the extinction of love. I see a parallel with other forms of extinction, where life and love drift into oblivion. So now we’re living through the planet’s sixth Mass Species Extinction, and the only one caused by one particular life form—ourselves. We all know what it means to love and lose love, so I give voice to one of the creatures we’ve unloved and lost forever.
I have no answers except by way of this song and my faith in human beauty and our capacity for redemption.
lyrics
After the End
1.
Mists are drifting over Chula Vista plains,
There’s warm breezes from the sea,
Cathedral bells are ringing in a midnight mass,
If I could write, I’d let you know I’m here.
Oh, what’s the difference now?
Desolation seeping through my veins.
Oh, what’s the difference now?
I can never turn to you again.
2.
In this place I’m just a trace of your forgotten world,
A eulogy for you to read,
I’ll just be a picture of a creature you’ve named,
And a god who has abandoned me.
Oh, what’s the difference now?
Cold water running through my veins,
Oh, what’s the difference now?
I can never turn to you again.
BRIDGE
Now it seems as though your love’s run out,
Draining from the mountain to the sea.
Nothing left but contemplations of yourself—
What you going to do about me?
3.
Now I’m haunted by your beauty and your cruelty,
My destruction you refuse to feel,
Just a metaphor of tears in an unmarked grave,
From my beginning to eternity.
Oh, what’s the difference now?
You loved me then you turned away,
Oh, what’s the difference now?
We can never come back here again.
Never come back here again,
Never come back here again.
Never come back here…
credits
from After the End,
released June 11, 2022
Joustene: vocals, classical guitar, synthesizer, electric piano
Bella: vocals, percussion
'Sexy, smart, poetic—Joustene is a unique artist. One of the best singer-songwriters of the current era.' Felipe Rollins (The Musicians' Journal, June, 2023).
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