I've been doing some close reading for Lit classes. Used the song as a practice.
I've been thinking that this is indeed about depression. The evidences are there: stomachache (a symptom of depression), lack of concentration, and kneeling to graveyards (which symbolizes mourning). But more importantly, the song is about finding the cure.
Stealing glances through the keyhole
In a brick wall's wooden door
Chains are keeping quiet secrets
In two hundred year old folklore
I think there's something more to this. Like, the persona is trying to see through the past. And what the persona sees is something dark. The folklore? Well, it could also mean religion. There are some secrets in this religion being hidden by chains.
And the graveyard on Elizabeth
Where no one ever goes
Kneeling praying to a gravestone
But the gravestone never tells
This tells me something about mourning and trying to get some help from the people in the past. As if the persona is trying to get some actual help from the dead, maybe from their examples. Also, I believe that these lines actually happened in real life. V mentioned somewhere, I believe, that she had moments of going there.
Here are pictures of what I believe is the said cemetery.
December, crossing on to Chinatown
As the wind starts to cut through
Always, always on the look out
But the poison's running through you
Stomach aches, trying to concentrate
Up the stairs another floor
Now I'm asking a witch doctor
But the witch doctor won't tell
V mentioned once about her Chinese witch doctor who brings her herbal medications and such, hence the Chinatown. I think this whole verse is about how the persona tried to seek help from the said witch doctor. The fourth line also suggests that there is already a knowledge that she is poisoned (hence her need to consult to a witch doctor) although it is soon realized how she caused it to herself.
The last four lines paints a picture of desperation. Again, she is trying to get help, to no avail.
Hear the bells
Hear the bells
This is the real remedy itself - the one she had been seeking throughout the song. What remedy exactly, I'm not yet so sure. But I've been thinking like a sort of wake-up call...
Floating on the sea
Stars are watching me
Current takes me out
What will be, will be
This is the epiphany, how she managed to arrive that hearing the bells (or waking up) is the key. Well, let me explain...
In the first two lines, there's a picture painted: she is floating somewhere with stars overhead. Notice that she was the one being watched by the stars, not the other way around. The reference to stars can be connected to a line in "London" where she says:
But the wolves howl to the moon
And she never answers back
Connecting it, we can make a fair interpretation: That she had been floating out somewhere, and the stars (or the object of faith) had not been doing anything, just mere watching.
For the last two lines, it probably represents uncontrollable happenings, to the point that she was taken out to the middle of the sea (or ocean) and the stars still do nothing about it. We can metaphorically interpret it as being in life, being thrown with a lot of hardships, but still you get no salvation from the stars.
Hence, hear the bells - wake up. Maybe, wake up from religion, or faith. I don't know for sure. But she is telling to wake up, the stars won't save you, what will be will be, so wake up and swim your way.
