IVY INTERPRETATION ݁˖𓂃☘︎˖.
The most common interpretation I see for ivy is a woman having an affair with another man, though I see it differently.
My interpretation of Ivy is a widow who lost her husband. She has built up walls, refusing to move on from him. She meets a man, and they begin to fall in love. He breaks down every wall she has built around her, reigniting the spark she once felt. She fights internal battles with herself throughout the song. The battle between if this situation is right or wrong. She eventually finds peace within the situation and falls completely in love, moving on but keeping her late husband in her heart.
“Your touch brought forth an incandescent glow” Incandescent is light being emitted from heat, a comparison to the warmth you feel when you’re in love.
“Tarnished but so grand” Tarnished is a metal losing its luster, becoming dull. To me, this line is feeling the love you felt before for the second time.
“And the old widow goes to the stone every day / But I don’t, I just sit here and wait / Grieving for the living” A widow is a woman with a late spouse who has not remarried. This line is explaining the grief felt after losing a husband.
“My pain fits in the palm of your freezing hand / Taking mine, but it’s been promised to another” This describes finding your person fitting together perfectly like a puzzle. It also adds that the vow of marriage already happened, being promised to her late husband.
“Oh, I can’t / Stop you putting roots in my dreamland / My house of stone, your ivy grows / And now I’m covered in you” The house is a metaphor. She put up a stone wall blocking herself off from the possibility of moving on. This new man is like ivy, an invasive plant. Even with these stone walls blocking him from her heart, he is still taking an effect on her, taking said walls down.
“I wish to know / The fatal flaw that makes you long to be / Magnificently cursed” A fatal flaw is a character trait that leads to someone’s downfall, for example, Macbeth’s ambition. This man’s fatal flaw would be his persistence to be with her, a woman constantly thinking about her late husband. She describes him as magnificently cursed. This is an oxymoron, as magnificently is used in a positive way and cursed is used negatively. Magnificently is used to say something is done in an impressive way, typically giving praise. Being cursed is usually supernatural doom. She’s saying it’s a beautiful love that is destined to go wrong.
“He’s in the room / Your opal eyes are all I wish to see / He wants what’s only yours” Her late husband will always be there, even if it isn’t physically. She expresses looking forward to seeing the new man, even if she was promised to her late husband, who in her mind she is still promised to.
“What would he do if he found us out?” This is her having second thoughts about the situation. She is worried about whether her late husband would disapprove of what has happened; she is fighting an internal battle with herself.
“He’s gonna burn this house to the ground” She self-decided her late husband wouldn’t be okay with what was happening. The guilt has seeped in, and she is having second thoughts about the situation.
“I’d live and die for moments that we stole / On begged and borrowed time” In her heart, she still belongs to her late husband. The moments once shared between her and her husband are now shared with a new man. The special moments between her and her husband are being actively replaced with a new man.
“So tell me to run / Or dare to sit and watch what we’ll become / And drink my husband’s wine” She’s giving the new man an opening to break free from her and the circumstances it comes with. He chooses to stay with her and continue their relationship. I see the line of drinking her husband’s wine as taking over her late husband’s role in her life, almost replacing his presence.
“So yeah, it’s a fire / It’s a goddamn blaze in the dark / And you started it” She’s starting to accept the newfound reality: the fire is the warmth she feels from this man. The blaze in the dark is the emptiness she felt after her husband died. This new relationship lit that old flame within her that she used to feel.
“So yeah, it’s a war / It’s the goddamn fight of my life / And you started it” She is still having internal battles with herself, fighting over the idea of right and wrong in the situation.
“Oh, I can’t / Stop you putting roots in my dreamland / My house of stone, your ivy grows / And now I’m covered / In you” This is a repeating line, but in this circumstance, I believe it is her acceptance of the situation. She isn’t deciding if the situation is incorrect; she is just simply accepting it.
All of this is an interpretation, not factual.
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