Trivia 轉 : Seesaw – A Metaphorical Take On Relationship Equilibrium
Trivia 轉 : Seesaw, composed and produced by SUGA (with Slow Rabbit), is a solo-track featured in BTS’s LOVE YOURSELF 結 ‘ANSWER’ (2018) and is a remarkable combination of disco punk and synth pop. SUGA, a master story-teller, metaphorically affixes his lyrics with beautiful imageries and analogies supplementing listeners with an aid, helpful in grasping a composition’s signification down to all its nuances and tones.
The song details around a relationship which has become emotionally exhausting and draining. As is the title of the song, SUGA uses a seesaw metaphor to describe the imbalance and the inequity within this relationship and pleads acceptance in the form of wanting to “get off” of it.
THE METAPHOR
A seesaw or a teeter-totter oscillates up and down and this motion is governed by the weight each party brings with them when they take their seats, using the same to manoeuver. A proper distribution of weight stabilises the seesaw and an equilibrium is achieved. In real life, this “seesaw game” is an emotional one, repeating itself with one party pulling their weight towards the ground as emotional propriety of a given situation so beckons.
The beginning of any relationship is built on seemingly indestructible promises of hope and endurance, of never letting go and seeing through the end, together. Blame-taking comes easy and sacrificing for the other doesn’t seem that big of a deal. There’s presence of an energy that shapes every mishap into a blossoming petal. One doesn’t mind being the ‘heavier one’ and doing all the work as the ‘lighter’ one takes the boost. Along the way, as life begins to play hard ball in the form of external challenges and personal cesspools this illusion breaks for many and roots of bitterness and discontentment begin to embed in a core which simmers in heartache. It starts to feel like a “meaningless waste of emotions” and the ride on which they jollily took their seats, now leaves them disconsolate and despondent.
SUGA after having laid down the groundwork in the first two verses (see above) begins to question and identify the exact set of moments which could have led to this condition of inequity and emotional drainage in the third verse. He wonders if it were the petty arguments from the beginning or did this condition siphon because he let himself be the heavier one for far too long without reciprocation? He further muses how there’s never really been a proper ‘balance’ to this teeter-totter accounting the same as a reason behind this “repeating seesaw game”, bearing no semblance to an established equilibrium even after so long. He continues pondering on this imbalanced repetition asking if what they have is even love? He arrives at a negation and sings,
“ If it was love, and if it is the word love itself, would there be any need to repeat it?”
Note how Seesaw’s official choreography entails an ‘oscillatory’ dance move which represents motions of a literal seesaw!
IDENTIFYING DYSFUNCTION: THE SEESAW GAME
The third verse bleeds into the main chorus: a supplication masking an acceptance of needing to be free from this endless cycle which has turned toxic, bringing nothing but pain and misery to the players and the realisation that the only way of putting an end to it is to stop playing the game, once and forever.
“A repetitive seesaw game
I try to put an end to it only now
Someone has to get off this seesaw
Let’s not drag it on and do as we please
Now, stop
But I can’t”
SUGA through the last line manages to compress a mountain-load of meaningful psychological and sociological discourse surrounding toxic relationships and ones inability to leave. Sometimes, inspite of accepting that we need to leave a toxic sphere, we end up staying because human beings are creatures of habit. A dysfunctional dynamic having gone on for too long is still ours and in an ironical way provides us with comfort and certainty. The process of letting go or ‘getting off the seesaw’ is daunting because there exists great probability of finding ourselves in a new reality and having no idea how to navigate. We thus, find it hard to move on and continue to be a slave, stuck inside a labyrinth of toxicity as a toxic labyrinth is still a territory ‘known’ to us. There’s this presence of control even if it really isn’t there.
Another discourse is delved into in the fourth verse where SUGA blatantly calls out human nature soaked in selfishness, hypocrisy and diplomacy. He further builds upon the seesaw model and faults a human-heart’s attempt at playing a game of ‘holier than thou’ with the other party. When a person hops off his designated seat he leaves the other, on the opposite side, without a balancing weight and a high probability of getting hurt by falling to the ground, without anything to cushion the fall. It is to avoid this guilt and not take the blame of hitting the final blow to an already dead relationship that has human beings “awkwardly passing the buck”, hoping that it is the other who chooses to get off and part ways. It’s a selfish way of incentivising the final break-up to one’s own benefit- seeking praise to the tune of ‘I held on till the very end’ unlike the other who’ll be left to burden the frown of not trying enough!
He continues this verse and observes how this game of “not coming across as the bad guy” has left them both even more exhausted, distant and diverged from each other, so much so that that they now stand at “parallel” sides with no reconciliatory attributes in common. SUGA brings us back to the seesaw model lamenting,
“we end up becoming exhausted, ironically reaching the paralleled balance
Ay, this is not the kind of balance I wanted”
The beginning of the fifth verse plays with the word ‘heavier’ entailing two different meanings based on how a typical toxic relationship progresses: one is based on the metaphor of the relationship-seesaw as mentioned earlier (the happy blame-taking and the easy sacrifices early on) and the other being quite literal – pinning blame over who’s dragging the other (and the relationship) down and who’s responsible for its impending ruin as it becomes a “tinderbox for war.”
“In the beginning, we brag about who is heavier
and smile, looking at each other
Now we became to compete over who is heavier”
THE SWITCH
As the croon of SUGA’s rap brings us towards the end of the song there appears a change in the musings and the wonderings. The confrontational lyrics take a turn towards realisations, comprehensions and acceptances;
We should stop pretending to care for each other and decide now
If you don’t have feelings for me anymore,
being on this seesaw is dangerous, dangerous
The chorus repeats itself and the supplication of wanting to get-off re-runs fading into the final climax of the song, condensing the discovery of wanting to finally let go and move on from an emotionally noxious relationship. The lyrics streamline towards securing a comprehensive consciousness resulting in finally breaking free from the chains of toxicity draped over and around this seesaw.
I walk on this seesaw that you aren’t on
(Hol’ up Hol’ up) Like that time in the beginning when you weren’t here
(Hol’ up Hol’ up) I walk on this seesaw that you aren’t on
I get off this seesaw that you aren’t on
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
Jane Hirshfield, an American poet and essayist, in a TED-Ed video titled ‘The Art Of The Metaphor’ elaborates on how a “metaphor gives words a way of going beyond their own meaning. They are handles on the door of what we can know and of what we can imagine. By making a handle, you can make a world.” SUGA introduces listeners to an all new modus operandi of gauging our relationships, prompting them to reasses their own metaphorical seesaw(s) as a healthy relationship has direct impact on both mental and physical well-being. If a connection which seemed magically watertight in the past is now drowning in anguish and cataclysmic tensity, it’s time to get off and leave the seesaw-game, permanently.
This song is an essential part of BTS’s Love Yourself concept series which creates a narrative by linking the key songs in each album into a single theme. The ‘ANSWER’ album celebrates the novel blossom of finding love and connection (Euphoria, Serendipity, DNA and Trivia 承: Love), develops the concept of heartache by shifting focus to the inner-self (Fake Love, Singularity, The Truth Untold, Trivia轉: Seesaw and Tear) and finally concludes with a reverberatory message that loving oneself is where true love begins.(Epiphany, Idol and Answer: Love Myself)
Trivia轉: Seesaw sets the stage for mending and healing of the self as one learns to identify the emotional drain, contemplate on its worth and walk away towards self-discovery and self-love.
- Translation Credits – doolset lyrics
