Year of Love - Jenny Hval

We were married on a rainy day

Isn’t that how the song goes?

I wore black jeans and codeine

I guess I wanted to make sure

I seemed «relaxed»

«It's just for contractual reasons,» I explained

Signing the papers

As if I truly believed that a contract was further

From the institution than the industrial happiness complex

But in the year of love

I signed a deal with patriarchy

Now watch me step

Into the place where you can see me: Look at me

You think that I’m different, but I’m a stagehand

Look, it’s there, under the ring

The imprint on my skin

Oh, a year later, I’m on stage

When a man proposes to a woman

Right in front of me, in the middle of a song

I thought I knew what was about

And I am holding a disco flashlight

It is meant to make the audience

Feel like multitudes of colors

That belong to nobody in particular

That they share between their bodies

But now all it does is light up a proposal

A normcore institution

I am giving it my voice, but then again, I already did

Oh, already did

But in the year of love

I did what I never thought I would

And you may think I’m different

But listen, all contracts can be sung with my voice

I’m just a stagehand

Look, it’s there, under the ring

The imprint on my skin