La Cigarra

Maria de Lourdes' song 'La Cigarra' is a poignant exploration of sorrow, unrequited love, and the inevitability of death. The song opens with a plea to the cicada, asking it to stop its incessant singing, which pierces the singer's soul like a dagger. This metaphorical use of the cicada's song represents the singer's deep emotional pain, as the cicada's song is traditionally associated with the end of its life. The singer is acutely aware that the cicada's song heralds its own death, mirroring the singer's own feelings of despair and mortality.

The second verse introduces a conversation with a sailor, questioning whether there is a color darker than the singer's sorrows at the bottom of the sea. This imagery of the deep, dark ocean serves to emphasize the depth of the singer's grief, suggesting that their pain is as vast and unfathomable as the ocean itself. The use of the sailor as a confidant adds a layer of universality to the song, as sailors are often seen as worldly and knowledgeable, yet even they cannot provide solace or answers to the singer's profound sadness.

In the final verses, the song shifts to a more personal narrative, with a wounded dove symbolizing the singer's own heartache from unrequited love. The dove's exhaustion and resignation reflect the singer's own weariness in seeking a love that is never returned. The song concludes with a resolve to embrace life and death with the same passion, choosing to die singing like the cicada. This final declaration is both a celebration of life and an acceptance of its end, encapsulating the song's themes of love, loss, and the transient nature of existence.