The Westward of Time

Lyrics

 * 1 "No idea what a “Mach ship” might be. It might be a Mach-speed ship. It might be a ship actually belonging to Ernst Mach, since the line could actually be rendered as “Mach's ship”. Or it may be connected to Mach's principle, which Hawking and Ellis restate in their book about space-time as being “Local physical laws are determined by the large-scale structure of the universe”."
 * 2 "“Day” (日 hi) is in quotes in the original in two places. Not sure what that means. Maybe it's “day” in the broader sense of “time of brightness”, which could span eons. I do not think it's “day” as in “the sun” (also hi) because other lines in the song clearly use an alternative character for “sun” (陽 hi), though I guess that's still a possible interpretation. At any rate it seems to indicate the past or the end of an particular time."
 * 3 "The west often symbolizes aging, the passing of time, and death. Apparently Jung also thought it symbolizes the “outer” while the east represents the “inner”. Possibly this song is about trying to cast oneself into a particular moment that lies outside/beyond the regular flow of time, possibly to see an alternative “tomorrow”, though this might be only attainable in dreams or memories, or by casting off one's inner self and merging into the “outer”. No clue.
 * Somewhere on the internet I came across an interpretation of this song as being about the Earth as a vessel carrying all of creation. That makes sense to me, as the planet is moving ever forward, but really it's just going 'round and 'round the same old sun. Eventually it'll orbit back to where it started. It could also apply to an actual spaceship orbiting a star or planet, of course. And if you keep in mind that an orbit is essentially what happens when one object falls “falling” (due to the force of gravity) around the central object, then "casting yourself into the old day" makes a bit more sense in either case.
 * I couldn't listen to this song in the weeks after the 3/11 disasters in Japan, with images of a “wave that could destroy a thousand countries” too stark in my mind. I wonder if perhaps the terrible tsunami that hit Thailand and other countries around the Indian Ocean 2004 are related to this song."