Autumn Leaves / Dead Leaves - RM Rap and Lyricism Compendium
- Jassyy bonsai
- May 13, 2022
- 7 min read
Updated: May 19, 2022
To start the RM Rap and Lyricism Compendium, Let's begin with his part in Autumn Leaves/Dead Leaves:
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Like how all dead leaves eventually fall. Like how all that felt everlasting eventually gets far away.
'Autumn leaves', can be about the comparison of a fading-away relationship to a withering leaf. As stated in Namjoon's first lines, a fading relationship, or when a couple is sailing away from each other, is like a leaf in autumn, falling leaf, dead and crisp. A relationship was also associated with the fact that nothing on Earth is eternal, everything that we thought will last will eventually end. "Like how everything will come to its end, our connection is nearing our end".
Autumn Leaves can also be correlated with youth since the album concept is about it (The Most Beautiful Moment In Life). These lines used dead leaves as a metaphor for something fading away, which is, in this case, can be youth. People get older as time proceeds and this could imply that their youth is starting to end, they're becoming 'adults'. This also implies that time is meant to continue and thereupon, there is change. "Like how everything is bound to conclude, our youth is nearing the end".
Reminded me of House of Cards lyrics:
"Though we see the end, though we know that it’ll soon collapse...though it’s an empty hope, stay like this a little more"
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You’re my fifth season– though I try to see you, I can’t see you
This line made me realize how great the love that they are trying to articulate is. There're only four seasons, right?; summer, spring, autumn, and winter, then, what is the fifth one? Obviously, there is none. The fifth season here is nonexistent, so I came up with two conclusions;
The life form (be it person or thing) they are referring to is something grandiose, too high to fit in the four other seasons, too beautiful to belong. The second line perhaps conveys that the relationship is crepuscular enough to not clearly see or feel each other's sentiments, and love.
These lines can be directed to their youth. The youth here is referred to as something with significance and memory, a season where the time is evidently limited. Youth is unanimously(by the world) associated with freedom and this freedom is also another thing that is starting to fade away. When time passes, the fifth season will be nonexistent, and will only linger in our memories, and in the second line, it seems that it is beginning to wilt.
It also reminded me of Butterfly lyrics:
"I still can’t believe it. All of this feels like a dream. Don’t try to fade away"
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Look, for me, you’re still colored in green
This line really got me, a very romantic line, approved by me.
Autumn leaves or Dead leaves, in colour, are brown-red-yellowish, and the textures are thin and crisp, and delicate, which is something a fading relationship had in common. Like these leaves, a fading relationship can easily break or crush.
This time, if we changed the subject to youth, this line implies that their youth is still fresh, still like before, and the freedom can still be felt. This might also be a symbolic statement for people who're 'young at heart' where their youthfulness is still present in their souls.
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My mind, though I don’t try, travels on its own. My lingering feeling gets hung piece by piece like wet laundry. Only the crimson-colored memories fall on my dirty self
The first line implies the description of 'overthinking' explained by a normal person. This time, we can say that the leaf is near its withering point, the relationship is between 'to continue' and 'to end', it insinuates how thinking happens, especially when the topic is about something heavy to one's heart. The emotions were compared to the wet laundry when it comes to heaviness. Those feelings that are heavy affect what we do, like drooped shoulders, heavy sighs, etc. Crimson is also equal to Red, and the third line can be explained like this: the phrase 'Crimson-coloured memories' refers to the memories that are full of love, memories that were centered in love. The 'dirty self' in the third line hints that they blamed themselves to have done something that caused the relationship to waver. So, in conclusion, Only those love-centered memories are remembered by them, someone who made the relationship fall slowly.
Sometimes (often), we, as a child, tend to have a short attention span. Our mind travels from one thought to another, resulting from numerous curiosities. A wet cloth, when hanged, will look limp and lifeless because of the water it carries, and the water in the second line is the lingering feeling, which might be sadness or fear of losing youth, and hence the laundry here is one's self. There is heaviness in their hearts that they've been carrying around the end of their childhood, this heaviness might actually be sadness because the end of their youth is nearing, or fear, of course, for the same reason. Crimson can also be translated as 'vivid red'. The phrase 'Crimson-coloured memories' could be important or notable memories because the Red colour signifies the importance of something and the colour itself is alluring and appealing.
Going back, the 'dirty self' is someone at a young age, an age where playing with dirt is still present in their heads. Simply, like Namjoon's first lines, this is the season when the line where youth and adulthood meet, or their youth is near to conclude, they expressed the sadness that comes with upcoming grief.
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Though I don’t shake my branches, they fall on their own. Yeah, my love falls in order to rise. Even when we’re close, my eyes get blind, and we get distant. I get abandoned like this
The first line, simply, means that things go without even trying. Basically, if we shake a tree branch, there's a chance that leaves will fall. The first line refers to leaves that freely fall without even doing anything, like dead leaves. It means that even if you don't do anything, things will eventually leave because we're in no control, mirroring Namjoon's first lines: "Like how all dead leaves eventually fall. Like how all that felt everlasting eventually gets far away". Like when we meet people, everyone that seemed to stay with us eternally will eventually leave us.
In the first line, they may refer to (1) hope in mending the relationship. In this case, "Hope slowly falls even we feel like it's a normal day" if we summarize it. (2) the person/people involved in the relationship. People come and go, they never stay, if I were to speak. Eternal is nonexistent on Earth, like dead leaves, people wither and fall, break and leave. (3) the relationship itself. They were talking about that fall of the connection between them, and they used the opposite of the motion of shaking the branch, wherein leaves fall even though the branch wasn't shaken, and in the said line, they simply mean that the relationship is fading without them realizing. Moving on to the second line, the second line parallels a lyric passage from 'Girl Of My Dreams' by Juice Wrld and SUGA:
"You realize that it was love when it ends and so it ends"
There are things in life that we are required to detach from to alleviate the pain and realize, learn, and grow from it. There's this phrase that goes "You're so close, yet so far" this refers to their closeness physically but having a distant personal, emotional, and/or romantic connection, and the third line seems to be summarized similarly in the said phrase, but let's look closely. The phrase 'my eyes get blind' refers to the ignorance of actions that may have caused the wavering of the relationship. It's similar to the phrase "turning a blind eye" that we often hear. To summarize the third line, it means that they're close physically but their minds wander somewhere else or they are not that interested anymore, and with this act seemingly getting obvious, they ignored those and instead they got more emotional and personally distant, the feelings are not as strong as before. Then the relationship ended.
Moving to the next topic; Youth. They are pointing out that without even trying, youth will eventually leave because it is just a phase of one's life. To be able to grow, we need to let go of things that had hindered our maturation, we need subtly let go to grow. In order to grow, we need to let go of youth and let us grow by facing adulthood. The second line parallels an excerpt from 'the sun and her flowers' by rupi kaur:
"why is it that when the story ends, we begin to feel all of it"
I was reminded of the phrase 'So close yet so far' in the third line. There're multiple times when we feel distant from one another even if our skins are touching. The said phrase refers to the personal or emotional connection that is, sadly, faint. We feel outlied from someone when we didn't really build a firm connection to hold on to. The third line tells that their youth is starting to fade even when they're still in the said season of life. It is implied that this period of life is when the shift from youth to adulthood happens. The youth started to feel distant when they were still close, then it left. It was sudden as alluded to by the last line.
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In the memories, I become young again
This, now, is the post-relationship wherein they can only remember and become young again in memories. Becoming young implies the start of the relationship or before the withering happens. Only in one's memories, they can be like before.
This season of life, presumably, is adulthood. Only in memories, one can evolve from someone he is before, like becoming young again, to feel one's youth that has left. Only in memories, he can become young.
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Translation credits
Note
ㄴ I was listening to Autumn Leaves while reading, then the thought of re-reading the lyrics appeared in my head. I read it until I reached Namjoon's Part, I was touched and wanted to give my time to analyze what this song holds.
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