Mathagana

Met in a dream, she came walking through the night
clinging close to me, she made me suffer that night
filled with beautiful memory
in the last watch, alone, she wounded me and left

In that pain am I,
in this darkness she burns

No peace in the heart,
her feelings beside me,
in the hour I sit sobbing
you come close to me,
you who wound me,
today you do not even hide in the dream

Your burning image,
no patience in the chest,
alone I burn in love,
no blue rain today,
a bittersweet part she played,
mathagana, she bloomed in the darkness

In that pain am I,
in this darkness she burns

This is a dark, feverish song about a love that will not leave the singer alone even in sleep. She comes to him walking through the night in a dream, clings close, and by the last watch of the night she has wounded him and gone, leaving him full of a beautiful, painful memory. From the first lines love here is inseparable from suffering.

The refrain fixes the mood: I am in that pain, and in this darkness she burns. There is no peace in his heart. Even as he sits sobbing she draws close to him, the very one who wounds him, and now she no longer even bothers to hide inside the dream. The line between memory, dream, and waking has dissolved, and she torments him across all three.

The imagery turns to fire and flower. Her burning form leaves him no patience, and he burns alone in a love with no relief, no cooling nili wahi, no blue rain to put it out. The title word lands in the final line: mathagana, she bloomed in the darkness, like a flower that opens only at night, beautiful, intoxicating, and out of reach. It is a song about being consumed by someone who exists for you mostly in the dark.