To Be Alone With You

Sufjan Stevens

This is my favorite love song by Sufjan Stevens. So beautiful and sensual. I love how the focus is blurred and the story of love takes on new meanings as it unfolds.

I would swim across Lake Michigan…To be alone with you.

This sure feels like physical love between two humans. But then it turns and feels more like sacrificial love — the Christ story. It’s a love song to the Spirit left behind. But the song turns again, and finishes with an almost unspoken homoerotic longing.

I’ve never known a man who loved me.

This is a song about intoxicating love. Every form of it. ❤️

I'd swim across Lake Michigan
I'd sell my shoes
I'd give my body to be back again
In the rest of the room

To be alone with you
To be alone with you
To be alone with you
To be alone with you

You gave your body to the lonely
They took your clothes
You gave up a wife and a family
You gave your ghost

To be alone with me
To be alone with me
To be alone with me
You went up on a tree

Aah, aah, aah
To be alone with me
You went up on the tree

Aah, aah, aah
I've never known a man who loved me
Aah, aah, aah