Released: October 28, 2011

Songwriter: Isabella Summers Florence Welch

Producer: Paul Epworth

[Verse 1]
And the heart is hard to translate
It has a language of its own
It talks in tongues and quiet sighs
In prayers and proclamations
In the grand deeds of great men and the smallest of gestures
In short shallow gasps

[Pre-Chorus]
But with all my education I can’t seem to command it
And the words are all escaping, and coming back all damaged
And I would put them back in poetry if I only knew how
I can’t seem to understand it

[Chorus]
And I would give all this and heaven too
I would give it all if only for a moment
That I could just understand the meaning of the word you see
Because I’ve been scrawling it forever but it never makes sense to me at all

[Verse 2]
And it talks to me in tiptoes
And it sings to me inside
It cries out in the darkest night and breaks in the morning light

[Pre-Chorus]
But with all my education I can’t seem to command it
And the words are all escaping, and coming back all damaged
And I would put them back in poetry if I only knew how
I can’t seem to understand it

[Chorus]
And I would give all this and heaven too
I would give it all if only for a moment
That I could just understand the meaning of the word you see
Because I’ve been scrawling it forever but it never makes sense to me at all

[Chorus]
And I would give all this and heaven too
I would give it all if only for a moment
That I could just understand the meaning of the word you see
Because I’ve been scrawling it forever, but it never makes sense to me at all

[Outro]
No words
Poor language
It doesn’t deserve such treatment
And all my stumbling phrases never amounted
To anything worth this feeling
All this heaven never could describe such a feeling as I'm hearing
Words were never so useful
So I was screaming out a language that I never knew existed before

Florence + The Machine

Florence + the Machine is an English alternative band, co-founded by front-woman, Florence Welch, and keyboardist and producer, Isabella Summers. The band is managed by Mairead Nash who also managed the original duo, known at the time as ‘Florence Robot/Isa Machine’, after Florence Welch sang Etta James‘ “Something’s Got A Hold On Me” to her in a club bathroom in December 2006.

The band first found fame in their native UK. Their debut album, Lungs (2009), went Gold within the first week of release, Platinum in less than 6 months and 4x Platinum in just over a year. They broke into the USA market after an elaborate performance of “Dog Days Are Over” at the 2010 VMA’s.

Their sophomore album, Ceremonials (2011), debuted at #1 on the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand charts. The band embarked on their second arena-based tour, the Ceremonials Tour. Most dates completely sold out.