In a culture where Sylvia Plath can write a poem called "Daddy" about everyfather, everylover, everyman, Christine's gorgeous song is an amazing contribution to the archetypal "daddy" which is not, in this song, a literal father but a father figure: the girl seeking a father through her lover. Is it complex? Yes. Is it abnormal? No. This is one of Christine's most poignant, poetic songs. Saying it is about incestral rape is reducing the lyrics to a most brutal literalism. As the great writer Barry Lopez once said: "one's inability to read metaphor signals the death of the soul."
If I sound highfalutin' here, it's because this song moves me in ways so few songs do.
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