This is a reproduction of my e-mail earlier this night/morning to some other Vegafans I was discussing this song with. It was quite fun, useful and I hope you will like it, too.

Edit:

Big Space is one of my favourites. I always believed this song to be a song about writing like you all. "I'd rather stand in someone else's" could refer to the perspective in Suz's songs that is almost always different than Suzanne herself (that is, until Songs in Red and Grey came out).

If we analyse these lyrics closely, I think I can link it to "Language". First of all I think it's useful to state that writing is so much as speaking, both use language as the main component, just a difference in audio/visio.

The first sentence "Between the pen and the paperwork, there must be passion in the language" of the refrain sounds to me as a loss of meaning somewhere, just like in "Language": in that song there is a loss of meaning between the state of thinking and expressing the thought through words, "I won't use words again they don't say what I said they don't mean what I meant", that's the loss of passion that MUST have been there. This is repeated in "between the muscle and the brainwork" , the muscle is a tool for the brain, the brain instructs the muscles to write, and something might be lost in the process. "There must be feeling in the pipeline", notice the resemblence with "Rusted Pipe", the song we all know that is certainly linked to Language. The words come from feelings, as the water were the words in the pipeline, and now there is the feeling in the pipeline.

Now that I sort of proved the connections between Language, Rusted Pipe and Big Space, let's move on to the core of the song, the title "Big Space". The gap between the pen and the paperwork that you feel as you read lyrics which you don't understand, the passion/feelings/words/actual_meanings that must have been there, but not clear to you, that is the big space. That's where the pipeline of passion/words/feelings lead to, they squirt the water into the big space. Searching for this place of true meanings of songs, searching for the middle of the network of all the ending of pipelines, makes you wonder if the middle could be non-existent. Sometimes you feel you're close to this big space middle, but what if they just fade away in there, what if it turns out to be hollow?
All those endless meanings/words/passion/feelings flow into it, are they there at all or now no more than a pile of swept up garbage, "left-over"-feelings? Can we fix the pile up (fix what is broken), and put everything back in space? Or should we leave them as they are, forgotten, misunderstood, thrown away, garbage.

Still, it's a singer's "work" to write, it's a job to bring bread into kitchen, although it must be frustrating for a singer not to know the meanings of his or her own writing, so "beyond the duty and the discipline", another gap that taps into the Big Space is found, these frustrations are added to the pile, to the subconscious where all the anger/meanings/water/words/ flow to, the Big Space, the avenues of angels...

Yours,
Spikey

Hi Spikey,

You wrote your message over one year ago, but I am in a mood to respond today ;-)

I am thinking of Suzanne songs over past few days.

Poet never says, he couldn't write anything new. But what if feelings were swept? So no way to write, when feelings are swept into big space and it is hard to find them, because of duty and discipline? She might be angry. I think, Spikey, you can agree with me at this point.

But I can see the sense in this song when I consider this song as a whole. The first verses are very important to me. If I remember correctly this is a conversation Suzanne had with someone (sorry, I can't remember who it was). Suzanne is trying to convince that person that she writes from perspective of someone else, but he consists that this is her own direction. Then she sings it must be feeling in the pipeline between the muscle and the brain work (I understand here as feeling being prepared to come out in process of writing, as you might see, it must be in before). It is beyond doubt for me, but what kind of feelings are they? Can she be concentrated on her own life or expressing her empathy only? This is what differentiate Suzanne's early work and Suzanne from Songs in Red and Gray, I think. There must be a certain mood to write song like in the first albums. I hope, Suzanne could write such songs today, but I am afraid, there must some kind of restlessness in conquering the world and people's feelings. It might be that Suzanne loves too much today, and her love couldn't be taken from her and it lasts for ever, so it has brought her some kind of peace of mind (Hello, Ruby!). I am wondering....

If I had a wish, my wish would be... to can see Suzanne writing and singing about friends, enemies or whoever it might be, but from her own perspective and someone else's shoes. Well, everything is flowing... But if this is impossible, let flow things as they are. My main concern is that everybody is happy over here and happiness of all of you is my happiness :-)

be well

Anna Maria K.

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"like a shadow, I am and I am not"

hi anna,

i think this song gains a deeper meaning when connected with "rusted pipe". if feelings are lost into the "avenues of angles" within the interior "big space", the only way to hope to recover them is to try and be a good vessel for them, a good "pipeline", by slowly removing the "rust" from the "pipe", and staying attentive. the feelings will return, in their own time. "somewhere deep within/hear the creak/that lets the tale begin".

you ask: "what kind of feelings are they?" and i ask you: does it really matter that much? i understand what you're trying to point out between suzanne's early work and "songs in red and gray", but i think that the only thing that really changed was the point of perspective, so to speak. "i like to keep perspective". the wish of keeping perspective has remained, but from where one looks has changed. but even in "songs in red and gray" there are songs written from a different perspective, her own, and from someone else's shoes: "soap and water" is the best example.

so, all in all, i think your wish has already come true.

love,
fátima

Hmm. We all seem to differ in how we feel about it.

BTW I wrote "angels" instead of "angles". Funny!

Very weird, I got Fatima's post and Spikey's, but I never got Anna's—so I was lost. Now I have to read the whole thread to find out what's going on.

This is an interesting one—another favorite song of mine...some killer lines.

Catherine

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"If we don't change the direction we are headed,
we will end up where we are going."

—Chinese Proverb

Dear Fatima,

I must say, that your words gave me hope for myself. I mean, my feelings are swept now and you say I could change this. Very optimistic. “Rusted Pipe” says a lot.

Still thinking, that it is important what kind of feelings are they. You may disagree with me, but people hardly ever could forget about own “i”. To do this is hard work and need much time. It might be too, that I misunderstood word “perspective”. In context of “Big Space” I understand to keep distance, to see things through somebody else's eyes. This is what I miss the most in Suzanne's “Songs and Gray”. Anyway, I wrote about this once, to be honest such perspective is an illusion. We can never get rid of our own “i” truly. They are still our feelings, but this is empathy what makes us see things from someone else's direction. These are redirected feelings, but still they depend what we are feeling from our own standpoint. We can redirect our feeling or not. I think, it depends on spiritual condition or some important situation for us. Such situation could focus our mind on own life instead on life in general.

What if the strongest connection I could see between “Big Space” and “Men in a War”? What then?

Be well

Anna Maria K.

---

"like a shadow, I am and I am not"

dear anna,

i'm very glad you found hope for yourself in my words. but remember that i took that hope from these two suzanne songs we're discussing. actually i believe suzanne's music to be hopeful or to always be looking for ways to find hope.

when i said that to know what kind of feelings they are didn't really matter that much, i was talking in the context of the song "big space" alone. in it suzanne talks about feelings in general, almost in an abstract way: "all feeling falls into the big space".

no, i don't disagree with you. i believe that our own "i" is always there. suzanne's is there too when she writes, but i think she's able to find those parts of it which she recognizes as equal in everyone. since you can only recognize in others what you already know of yourself, suzanne can write from the point of view that best reflects her and others at any given time. with that point of view comes a perspective, a range or depth of field. and with suzanne this perspective is always wide and deep layered, precisely because she writes from those parts of the "big space" that we all can recognize as being ours as well. this perspective might seem more 'narrow' in "songs in red and gray" but it is still wide enough, in my opinion, to embrace the "empathy" you talk about. and i also agree that how you look at others depends on how you look at yourself and therefore reflects your spiritual growth, or, which is the same, what you have retrieved from your own "big space".

i can see the connection between "big space" and "men in a war": they both talk about things that are lost. but the question i ask myself and you is this: even when things are lost forever how do you look at that loss? i look at that loss as a way of learning. "you just make do with whatever you've got". and here we come back to the "perspective" theme, to how we look at things and from which point. ultimately you come back to the "i" (and so to your own "big space"), which in suzanne is almost always a "we" too. change the "you" with either an "i" or an "we" in the line i quoted above from "men in a war" and it rings true as well.

i hope i made sense to you. and thank you for keeping this discussion with me.

love,
fátima

Dear Fatima,

Yes, all what you've said makes sense to me. I can say more, this is a sweet, deep sense, directed straight to my spirit. Thank you. All is true, but what if we stooped thinking for a while of source and concentrate on technique. It seems there is the illusion of these "we" instead of "i". "I know there must be passion in the language", so maybe all is about finding proper words, proper story, proper image. "Passion in the language" seems to be core of such findings of equality, because story, image is more abstract and truth about us as human is delivered in a way that it universal. Just another perspective. It seems, that Suzanne has something in common with diplomat. ;-)

love,

Anna Maria K.

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"like a shadow, I am and I am not"

dear anna,

i've just read your post and have to thank you for your words. okay, let's concentrate on what you ask. actually the "we" is really there in this song: "it seems we're looking for a center" and "we could be fixing what is broken". and the stanza where it is used points to an aim: "looking for a center" and "fixing what is broken". but in suzanne's music it's not really the aim that matters, but rather the process, the action, the movement, the journey we undertake to eventually fulfill the aim or not (and therefore the use of "it seems" and "we could be"). what we might find "beyond" is relevant, but the real job is experiencing and living through what is "between".

spikey is right to bring the song "language" to this discussion. but in "language", to me, suzanne talks about the inadequacy of language as an aim, whereas in "big space" she is viewing it as a "pipeline", as what is between, and that is much richer, and really instrumental in looking at it in a different light: "i'm sure there's passion in the language". there's a big leap forward between these two songs. a leap of faith? i'd rather call it a leap of belief.

and yes, i agree with you: in this song suzanne shows her belief in language and its passion as a way of finding and expressing that which is equal in the "big space" within us. through language stories are told and images are created. and the key element in all this process is passion, which, as i see it in suzanne's work, should be read as a synonym of essence: stripping language to its foundation ["take this language/shake it well, subdue it/hold it, keep it still./stop its wiggling./club it. then/gouge it, smooth it./shape, hollow it out./point it and make it sharp/hollow, smooth, and round." ("how to make a poem")] is an extension of the task "the passionate eye" dares to do, which is to search and single out that which is one. and the source of it all is the passionate "i".

again, i hope i made sense to you. oh, and i also agree with your last statement.

love,
fátima

Fatima:
>spikey is right to bring the song "language" to this discussion.

It's nice to bring something into a discussion without bringing something into a discussion for over a year lol.

hi spikey,

in all honesty i have to say that i first replied to anna without reading your post. i must have missed it over a year ago, because i know i would have responded, since i believe this song to be really essential in suzanne's songbook.

so i have to thank you for starting this thread and for your views, and anna for picking it up and continuing it. and time is of little importance in this case.

love,
fátima

Come here Fatima. Closer. Even closer.

Spikey,

Where did you find that little guy? He's adorable! I wonder if these are "PC things" because I found a website with a bunch of them on there but when I tried to save them and copy them into things I was posting (from a Mac) it didn't work.

Oh well, at least we all get to enjoy him here in this "Big Space" of a web site.

Love, Catherine

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"If we don't change the direction we are headed,
we will end up where we are going."

—Chinese Proverb

dear spikey,

i can feel the warmth of your hug. thank you so much. it's very sweet of you. since i don't know where you found that little guy either, just consider yourself hugged back, as tightly as you hugged me.

and, using our collective imagination, i'm going to borrow it to send a very special hug to anna, and to all who dare to search within their inner big spaces.

much love,
fátima

OK. But we must make sure that this warmth does not fall into the big space.