You let me violate you.
You let me desecrate you.
You let me penetrate you.
You let me complicate you.
(Help me) I broke apart my insides.
(Help me) I've got no soul to sell.
(Help me) The only thing that works for me,
Help me get away from myself.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
I want to feel you from the inside.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
My whole existence is flawed; you get me closer to God.
You can have my isolation.
You can have the hate that it brings.
You can have my absence of faith,
You can have my everything.
(Help me) You tear down my reason.
(Help me) It's your sex I can smell.
(Help me) You make me perfect.
Help me become somebody else.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
I want to feel you from the inside.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
My whole existence is flawed; you get me closer to God.
* [see note at end of page]
-- Trent Reznor, "Closer" from the Nine Inch Nails album The Downward Spiral
While it is not my position that Trent Reznor penned "Closer" to be a primer for sexual mysticism (or mystical sexuality), the song does serve as such with only a cursory interpretation. I will make no speculation as to his intent when writing it since it is quite a stirring ode to primal lust on its face, but one does not have to dip far below the surface (and often not below the surface at all) to see a deeper meaning in the words that can serve as a reminder for practitioners or a guide for the uninitiated. I will give a line by line exposition of the song to show what I mean, but I feel it appropriate to offer a bit of background explanation for those who may be compleatly unfamiliar with the concept of sex as anything other than a pleasurable or procreational pursuit.
Sex has been more than simply a procreational affair for at least as long as humans have left a written record. As everyone knows at least most of the population has seen it as pleasurable as well, but many people have also used it for magical or mystical pursuits. Those who have used it as a source of mystical experience have found support and augmentation for their religious beliefs, built new religions around it, or simply found in it a path to divine union outside the confines of any specific religious framework.
As religion itself is merely a format for understanding how the divine process interacts with the observable world, specific religious dogma is unnecessary for mystical experience, sexual or otherwise. Many are familiar with at least the concepts of Tantra, either in its original Hindu form or in the form adapted for American and European cultures known as "Western Tantra." In its incarnation as Western Tantra it is much more fluid and flexible, having had all the Hindu significance boiled away while still retaining its ability to create and reinforce connections with the divine. But Tantra, western or otherwise, is not the only school of religious or mystical sexuality--and many of them differ greatly in form. One thing that remains the same between them, and seems to form the only core that is truly required to make sexuality a mystical experience, is the attitude with which sex is approached. Any particular practice from any form of sexual mysticism will be successful so long as the underlying attitude inherent in all of them is adopted. In fact, any sexual practice at all can lead to mystical experience so long as it is approached with the proper attitude.
In "Closer," Mr. Reznor gives us a pop-culture map for that attitude.
You let me violate you.
As a matter of definition, one cannot let someone violate them--the permission negates the act of violation. But in our culture sex is often seen as "violating" no matter what level of consent is involved. The fact that the act of sex, especially for pleasure, is such a "controversial" subject, and that even consensual sex is so often seen as somehow dirty or shameful, except in very specific situations, gives rise to this idea that sex is a violation (most specifically of women) regardless of whether it's consensual or not. Sex, between anyone other than a couple in a marriage or other "acceptable" long term relationship, is seen as a 'violation' by our society even if it is compleatly consensual.
You let me desecrate you.
"Desecration" is the opposite of "consecration." Just as the latter is the act of imbuing something with sacredness, the former is the act of removing sacredness from something--making it "un-holy." In many cultures the human body is seen as sacred, but this sacredness comes not from the fact of its indwelling spirit so much as from maintaining an arbitrary state of physical "intactness." Women (and, to a lesser extent, men) who engaged in sexual activity outside the confines of those approved by the Church were seen as no longer worthy of God's love because the Church believed that the act of sex desecrated the body and therefor rendered the spirit un-holy. Christianity is not the only religion which takes this view.
You let me penetrate you.
Such a blatant statement, the meaning of which is obvious. Of course "penetrate" is not necessarily limited to the breaking of physical boundaries. It can also refer to the penetration of psychological, sociological and cultural defenses. "Inside" is not always a physical place--just as you must go "inside" to explore mysticism you must let the other "inside" to allow the spiritual aspects of sexuality to bloom, or even the intimacy of true sex to occur. One of the reasons sex is seen as "dirty" by so many cultures is that people, as a whole, tend to keep up the defenses they maintain for day to day interaction. Sex, at its core, is an intimate thing--but intimacy cannot be acheived so long as you keep each other "outside," nor can mystical union occur so long as you keep others "outside."
You let me complicate you.
People are masses of contradictions and complications. Beliefs, opinions, quirks, habits...physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually, humans are not "simple" beings. But recognizing this and having to deal with it on a normal day to day basis would be too overwhelming--and if you don't understand this right away just look at the masses of prejudices and stereotypes we maintain in order to simplify dealing with strangers, and even friends. One of the first things to go, as far as simplifying people as individuals, is recognizing that we are all sexual beings. An example of this is the fact that the majority of people not only cannot conceive of their parents as sexual beings, they have odd psychological reactions to even the suggestion of it--despite the obviousness of its truth. This is true of nearly all interactions--the clerk at the convenience store, the librarian, the taxi cab driver--except those people whose jobs somehow entail sexuality (such as the 'exotic dancer' or the prostitute), in which case their existence tends to be diminished to that of a sexual object only. It seems to be rather difficult for most people to realize that everyone around them has both sexual and non-sexual components to their existence. It just seems too complicated to realize that constantly--and so recognizing that of someone else tends to both imply and create an intimacy of a sort, or at the very least a bond not there with the pressing mass of humanity as a whole.
In these first four lines, the basic external blocks put up by society and culture that prevent the union of people on a spiritual level are dealt with; their removal explained in the terms of sexual congress as seen by society. Since the song itself is, on its face, a love song from one person to another, the language is personal. But as people do share commonality, the message is "universal"--a guide to what needs to be done couched in a decription of what one person does.
(Help me) I broke apart my insides.
Introspection is often described as "looking (or going) inside." Self-examination, in the sense of "finding one's self" or "discovering who you really are" is often described in terms of "disection"--looking inside and disecting what you find to see what's "underneath." In this sense, this line simply states that he has already done his "soul searching" on his own--he has gone inside to examine himself to try to find his own divine nature.
(Help me) I've got no soul to sell.
This line would seem problematical for a great many people, even those who do not consider themselves religious or spiritual. But the seperation of the soul and the body is a relatively recent invention. Many people today believe as most did in the past, that the soul and body are inextricably intertwined. "No soul to sell" does not necessarily imply "no soul," just not a soul that can be explored, explained or understood without exploring and understanding the connection between the soul and body.
(Help me) The only thing that works for me,
While this *is* part and parcel with the next line, I said I'd do a line by line interpretation. He's already established that he's gone inside on his own--now he's reached the end of usefulness of the methods which got him to where he is now. Other "things" may have worked previously, but now there is only one thing that works for him.
Help me get away from myself.
"Myself" is a personal pronoun representing "me." In this case, it represents "the me that you see"--"myself" in the sense of the identification of what you think of when you think of me. This is not necessarily my self but the collection of actions, reactions, opinions and personality that interacts with society and people. All these are things that have been built through the process of cultural indoctrination, intervention and experience. But the point of most schools of mysticism is that these things are not the self but "layers" built on top of the self/soul that obscure it from others, and from ourselves. The goal of mysticism is to get away from "yourself" in order to discover your SELF.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
Another line with a fairly obvious meaning, since the phrase is rather common in English, at least here in the United States. But it should also be pointed out that whether you believe animals can have any intent for sex other than procreation, animals have sex without regard for societal mores, personal hangups or preconceptions. When they fuck they do it for the sake of fucking alone--there are no ulterior motives, and there are no distractions. Whatever your notions of animals' reasoning, whatever your ideas of the meaning of the phrase based on past experience with it, in the context of the messages of the preceeding lines as given here, "I want to fuck you like an animal" translates to "I want to fuck you so that nothing exists outside the two of us in that moment."
I want to feel you from the inside.
The first four lines represented the barriers imposed by society and interaction with it. One of those barriers is the tendency to "keep people out" as explored in the breakdown of the line about penetration. It's established that she'll let him inside, now he expresses the desire to take that opportunity and to explore that place "in" her that most people are denied. Just as he is looking to get away from himself to find his self, he desires the opportunity to go past herself to experience her self as well. We can find the divinity within our selves but this only helps us see it's there--to truly understand (attain union with) divinity we must recognize that it is in everyone else as well.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
The meaning of the line does not change simply because it is repeated, but as the last interpolation concludes that this line means "I want to fuck you so that nothing exists outside the two of us in that moment," the repetition of the line can be seen as an emphasis of it. Sexual union, whether it be for pleasure, for purpose, or both, can only truly happen when there is nothing outside of that act at that moment. It is, in fact, the most important line of the song just as that concept is the only one necessary for mystical union through sex. When nothing else exists outside of a single shared moment, even if only for that moment, then the facade of the seperation of the people involved also dissolves.
My whole existence is flawed; you get me closer to God.
This line is a combination of two distinct thoughts. At first glance it might seemed misplaced as the first concept is the foundation on which the rest is built, but it does work as a sort of cyclic thing since the second concept is the goal of the whole process--and it is the flawed concept of existence that tends to keep people from being able to "get closer to God."
"Existence," as is generally meant in day to day conversation, refers to the physical world around us, and to our physical presence in it. While it can, and often does, include more, it is still rooted in the "observable world." Most schools of mysticism, and even most religions, however, see this physical environment of ours as not only transitory but illusory--our concept of existence is flawed because we concentrate on the least important aspects of it, aspects that may have no "reality" at all as far as our souls are concerned. Mystical sexuality is one process of breaking through this illusion--of recognizing that (our concept of) "existence" is flawed.
Part of the "flaw of existence" is the false seperation of ourselves as individuals. Many, if not most, religions recognize that divinity is within each of us; that whether we call it by one name or many, whether we limit it to a "personalized deity" or see it as an all-encompassing, incomprehensible consciousness, we are all divine because we all contain divinity. Many religions and schools of mysticism "recognize" that this means God is not something that is "outside" of us, or even could exist "without" us, but that "God" is the totality of that all the "pieces" that are "contained" within each of us. We are God, both individually and collectively, and that to "understand" (acheive union with) God we must not only understand the divinity within ourselves but also understand the divintity that is within others and how they are "connected." Just as "God" is that union of the divine within all of us, whenever we are able to bring about a union of the divine within ourselves and someone else we get "closer" to "God."
You can have my isolation.
Just as the first four lines of the first verse dealt with "external" barriers imposed by society and our interaction with it that keep others from letting us in, the first four lines of the second verse move to a personal level, dealing with the "internal" barriers we maintain to keep others out.
Isolation is an illusion. While I would expect this to be implicit in the explanations already given, the song only offers the lines that are being interpreted and so this concept has not necessarily been mentioned directly yet. Here isolation is accepted as an impediment to growth, that seeing oneself as distinct from everyone and everything else is a hinderance in our quest to discover and explore the divine.
You can have the hate that it brings.
Hate is based on differences, real or imagined. Part of the process of creating the isolation mentioned in the previous line is the creation of differences so that a distinction can be made. Sloughing off the illusion of isolation entails recognizing that the differences are illusory, that on the spiritual level there are no differences. As hate arises from these differences, it must be a casualty of recognizing the unity of all things.
You can have my absence of faith,
When the concept of reality has physical existence as its basis, anything that cannot be proven objectively is a matter of faith. The absence of faith implies a need for objective proof in order to allow belief. When dealing with the spiritual, however, things can be "proven" beyond any doubt through experience, even though they cannot be
proven objectively through physical instruments. Spiritual truths can be held and experienced that are beyond faith and are unshakably proven, to the person who holds them, but to get to that point requires that one be able to have faith in the first place--the means to get to spiritual proof require a leap of faith. And, technically, no matter how thouroughly "proven" something is to someone, without have objective physical evidence it is still "faith" by definition due to the limitations of language.
You can have my everything.
This line relates back (forward?) to the concept of existence being flawed, to the concept of the "common self" simply being layers of illusion to mask the "true self," and to the fact that the isolation, hatred, and seperation of realization into 'fact' and 'faith' are all impediments to spiritual growth. One must be willing to give up all preconceptions and "understanding" in order to acheive divine union and true understanding.
(Help me) You tear down my reason.
Just as the second four lines of the first verse dealt with the reaction to the removal of the external barriers that keep us "outside" each other, the second four lines of the second verse deal with the effects of the removal of the internal barriers that we use to keep others "outside" of ourselves.
Reason is logic. Logic is a fundamental tool of understanding in that it allows one to extrapolate unknown information from known data. But the fact that logic can be "held" within a closed system sometimes limits its usefulness. In this particular case, spiritual truths become illogical (unreasonable) in a reality based on the conception of reality rooted in a physical existence because experiences that transcend physical reality can be explained as abberations of physical phenomena. It takes faith (the absence of which he has already forsaken) to admit that "non-physical" experience might be as "real" as physical experience--especially if that "non-physical" experience arises from physical action. But in this case reason (logic) can become a circular trap by the definition of the body and soul being seperate because one can be measured and the other can't.
He has already determined that he cannot find his soul as a thing that is seperate from his body, so reason (logic) would dictate that there is no soul. But by removing the barriers that keep people out, and actually letting someone pass those barriers, he can experience his own soul through the union of his with another--the existence of his soul is "proven" and reason is torn down.
(Help me) It's your sex I can smell.
Persistence of vision is a well-known phenomenon, and all the other senses can exhibit this state of "persistence" as well. Especially if the sensation occurs during a particularly evocative experience, the brain can hold on to imressions associated with it for a long time. If this seems a bit thin, or like the context is being stretched a bit far, keep two things in mind: I never said every line in the song was directly correlative to sexual mysticism, and this is a particular button of mine so I find it hard to get past the raw lust it raises to find an explanation "behind" it :>
(Help me) you make me perfect.
No one is perfect. But those imperfections come from the layers of personality built up to create ourselves, the misperception that arise from focusing on illusory reality and ignoring the underlying reality, the false sense of self-isolation that allows us to be individuals, and the effects that are compounded when all these are combined. Perfection lies in discovering and following our "true nature"--mystical sexuality is one path to discovering that true nature, and thus growing towards "perfection."
Help me become somebody else.
The concept of "self" as explored to the companion line in the first verse applies here, but the limitation of language still applies. Once you've "gotten away" from yourself in the search for your self, once you've managed to escape the limitations and false layers that define "you" as others see you (and most people see themselves), "who" are you? If you're not "you" anymore, the limitations of language only allow you to be "somebody else."
I want to fuck you like an animal.
So the line's been explained twice already and you have a pretty good idea what it means. But the second verse deals with different "themes" than the first, and so the second chorus starts from a different base. Just as spritual union depends on the removal of external barriers erected between us, so to does it depend on the removal of the interior barriers we erect. Following the verse about being "let in" through someone else's barriers, this line means that mystical sexuality can only be achieved when we can fuck like nothing exists outside that moment--what does it mean following a verse about letting someone in?
There is another vital element to spiritual union through sexual congress, but it can only be achieved with the ability to "ignore" everything else outside the moment--that element is ignoring everything "else" within the moment. Once you can let someone past your barriers, truly let them within your self, which is an admirable achievment in its own right, you experience the indescribable feeling of two souls mingling. It is an overwhelming experience and one that exists outside the capability of language to describe, but it is still a mingling and not a true "union." To experience it you must "lose" yourself, but to go past it you must also "lose" your self. When animals fuck, there is nothing else to them, and to fuck like an animal, at least in the context in which we are speaking here, there must be nothing "else" to you.
I want to feel you from the inside.
And here, too, the meaning stays the same but the differing context adds depth. In the first instance the line refers to feeling your partner from "inside" them--now you have removed your internal barriers and you can feel them from inside you.
I want to fuck you like an animal.
Repetition can denote emphasis, and the most important thing to grok is that you cannot acheive spiritual union until nothing else exists outside that moment, and it will not be truly successful unless nothing "else" exists within that moment.
My whole existence is flawed; you get me closer to God.
The standard structure of songs, and especially of pop songs, entails repetition, but the initial step of recognizing the fundamental flaw of our concept of "existence" leading to the ultimate goal of divine union bears repeating as well.
* There is another quatrain in the song, as written. But lyrically the structure differs greatly from the rest of the song and in the recording the vocals are electronically distorted and mixed at a level below that of the music, both of which indicate a "seperation" from the rest of the song. As it also has little, if any, bearing on the subject of this exposition (it being purely a component of the love/lust nature of the song), I have chosen to leave it out.