I love this song.
I'm kind of feeling this song as being about an emotional death of some sort. I don't know what I think yet about all of the lyrics, but here are a few that I have some thoughts about.
Why do you come around? You know it just brings you down...
He's going through the motions of something but not really feeling it. He knows he doing this and he's kind of disgusted with himself for doing it, but he's still doing it...
Anyone at all could see what was missing
Could see you were dying though no one was crying
It's clear to all that something is dreadfully wrong, but even he's not crying about it because he's too low and lost to do anything but continue going through the motions. Others aren't crying about it either because he's around people in the same state or he's unable to let them in.
And the lips you were kissing night after night
All were bathed in blue, all were bathed in white
I think this is a clear image of death. The blue lips on a white corpse. Are the lips his? Metaphorically, I think maybe.
Red rover, red rover we come to take you over
I guess this might be the fear that this feeling of "death" might come to take him over entirely, or it could be a certain warmth coming to try to bring him back.
In a few interviews he's mentioned going through a period of emotional exile in some ways at certain points through the years. I'm kind of seeing this as a statement about what that felt like.
My ramblings are complete.
