I believe, like many of their great songs, there could easily be 2 or more interpretations, even within the same song, or even in the same lines. WALK ON is like that.
It could be the church AND America.
"From the brightest star
Comes the blackest hole
You had so much to offer Why did you offer your soul?"
This sounds like America. Pretty as a picture, a bright star now filled with much violence and a decaying of values, and it sometimes seems we have lost our way, lost our soul.
"Would you deny for others what you demand for yourself"
Right now, rightfully or wrongly, many around the world see America as a place that demands human rights for others while denying human rights itself...torture of prisoners, illegal detaining of prisoners, beginning wars on flimsy reasons..etc etc.
So therefore...
"Cool down mama, COOL OFF!!"
America was attacked. So America ( probably rightfully so, or understandably so) attacked back, rolled back civil rights laws, got paranoid...BUT maybe we should cool down, cool off, be calm, rational. NOT rash. Not reckless. Let's think calmly now about what we should do now. How to stop this from happening again.
Africa, Mexico, Middle East...millions of poor around the world are:
Waiting for the crumbs from our table.
While our cash right now is spent on killing the enemy. (Cool down a bit.)
"With a mouth full of teeth you ate all your friends."
"And you broke every heart thinking every heart mends"
Does anyone remember the millions around the entire world protesting the start of the killing in Iraq? MOST of our friends, our allies, pleaded with us to cool down, wait, take it slow, don't rush into killing, into war, cool it down. We unilaterally ignored them, "ate all our friends", went ahead with the invasion, and now, we are hoping that that Europe has mended their hearts and will now help us finish the war.
We speak of signs and wonders, like democracy in the middle east, but, for so many including those who commit terrorist acts, they are starving, they are sick, they are dying, they are
Waiting for the crumbs from our table.
Just the crumbs, mind you. That'll help so much, sir.
One. One percent. Just crumbs.
America, listen: "Where you live should not decide whether you live or whether you die.
Mexico. Africa. Middle East. Where they live right now does decide it for them. Dignity passes by those who are hungry. They will take a chence of dying in a desert to cross a border. Dignity passes by the wayside when you drink your own urine while dying of thirst to get across the desert to where you just might be able to get some crumbs. They will beg. They will kill. They will suffer. We eat and drink while tomorrow they die. While they wait for the
Crumbs from our table.
Just my opinion. But when I hear it I think of ME, the crumbs from MY table, and my country...all of us. They are waiting. We have done so much but we can do so much more.
The song has, I'm sure, other meanings, and I'm sure it even has more than one meaning to Bono who wrote the words.
It is a great song, that is for sure. Let's not forget the great musical work of The Edge, Larry and Adam. The song is great all the way through it. Fantastic, thought provoking.
Another great one.
On the DVD, Larry jokes that its terrible that he has no idea what the song was about.
