


Pyramids in ancient Egypt were pointing skyward to the heavens, the divine, the sun. working one's way up to the divine, the top of the pyramid. It also sounds sometimes like the chorus is saying 'working up the pyramid tonight', possibly referencing Kabbalah again, i.e. Ocean also looks to be alternately horrified at the scene and laughing with glee at the strippers shakin it. Also see the alternately beautiful and disfigured faces of the strippers at the club. Usually this includes some sort of trying to reunite the male and female aspects of God and oneself, again connecting with the evident male/female dichotomy of the song. We long to have crazy meaningful experiences like when the guitar solo comes on and Ocean sees the major symbol of Kabbalah, which has different meanings, but is almost always a type of Jewish mystical map of humanity's path up to the divine. We're all trying to drown ourselves in absinthe (known to cause hallucinations, but it's a myth) and sex and violence and fancy motorcycles and champagne and fancy jazz music and money but we're all still longing for more. I don't think the video throws all those odd spiritual and surreal images into the song by accident. The second is a sense of trying to regain a sense of the sacred and mystical in the modern world. This meaning is really well explored in rap genius so I'll leave it at that. One is a lament and call to action about the fall of Africans from being the pharaohs and queens of the ancient world to being little more than slaves and strippers and pimps in the modern world. General CommentI see at least two possible double meanings and interpretations, both seem to have been touched on. The way you say my name makes me feel like You're wet and you're warm just like our bathwater You showed up after work I'm bathing your body Then put your panties on in the mirror, Cleopatra Wake up to your girl for now, let's call her Cleopatra, Cleopatra No more, he has killed Cleopatra, Cleopatraīig sun coming strong through the motel blinds No more, she lives no more serpent in her room Our war is over, our queen has met her doom Remove her, send the cheetahs to the tomb I found my black queen Cleopatra, bad dreams, Cleopatra I found you laying down with Samson and his full head of hair How could you run off on me? How could you run off on us? What good is a jewel that ain't still precious? Our skin like bronze and our hair like cashmereĪs we march to the rhythm, on the palace floorĬhandeliers inside the pyramid, tremble from the forceĬymbals crash inside the pyramid, voices fill up the halls We'll run to the future, shining like diamonds
