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Hi Ricki,

The first verse has some very powerful imagery, culminating in "a storm brews in my reflection" ...a spine tingly opening for me...this really has me on the edge of my seat!

Because of the way the movie unfolds, the second verse can indeed have multiple readings; my first impression was that with

I could tell by the look on your face
You were stranded in some darkened place
You were leaving and I could not go

the singer is still referring to/addressing her reflection. An interesting development, if so, with "you were leaving and I could not go", in that ...that would mean part of the singer had died, was now dead, and wasn't hanging around...

This "reading" can exist up to "I have dreams that do not include you" which forces me into a more modest interpretation, perhaps one that you've suggested. It makes V1 a bit of a red herring, but I can see you've written it that way to show she is indeed a little "beside herself", feeling like a stranger to herself, at least with the help of a damp window pane.

This is another powerful song for me, but this time it's the serious "feel" of the music that pushes more common thematic material into someplace unique.

The singer has lived through a loss of some kind, as you suggest, and she's working her way through vulnerable moments, but she's basically strong, and has a vision of the future as a brighter place, and says all this in believable way, like a real, very tangible human person.

I thought more time would make me strong
There isn’t time enough to last that long

it's an interesting way of saying that. The singer seems to disappear in the bottom line, it's an interesting effect of grammar, how that happens, I think it makes the line very strong, in that, if the singer DID attempt that longest of waits, she's intuiting perhaps that she herself WOULD somehow disappear. You seem to have said all that, with a tiny bit of "imperfect grammar", and it's another chilling moment for me

I was ready when the day had come
But not when day was done

The singer now reveals she has been to this dark place, that she was ready for it, but didn't expect to be "made unready"
(dismantled?) by it. Again nice writing, easy to read and sing, a little more complicated under the surface.

I have dreams that do not include you
I believe they will someday come true
What I need is a redeeming diversion
To erase this latest desertion


Now the singer ends with a resolution, a focused thought, a redemptive idea. It's the only bland writing in the lyric, imo, but I think the "flatness" more resides in the material than the presentation, and it might actually be a necessary "side effect" of the singer having to "get it all together" and make all these swimming (lyrical, poetic) thoughts "come to a head" (more prosaic)...

The music is a perfect match. It creates impressions in me of being in a very lonely or isolated or even "holy" place, and finding something worthwhile and beautiful and redemptive there, holding on to it, explore the possibilities of it; and together with the words, the possibility of a more "whole" and holy self to get through those bleak looking days to come.

Once again, enjoying your music, Ricki

Mike