The Boy Was Not Alone In His Melancholy . . .

My interpretation of this song is that, after a lot of pain and heartbreak, Harry is looking back at his last relationship and allowing himself to see it for the good parts, to reminisce on the parts that made him happy. I picture him thinking about random snapshots of domestic life, in no particular order, disorganised (as very often thoughts happen to be), and smiling to himself. He’s not hurt and he’s not sad anymore. He’s moved on and can see the entire thing for its positives.

(the lyrics are taken directly from Fine Line’s official booklet)

He’s calling back to that moment where you’re starting something with someone and you have all those HUGE feelings. It’s my understanding that he’s telling his lover that he wanted them more than being able to write music, which coming from Harry, is a huge statement.

This is the first indication we have that he’s singing about reminiscing on his relationship rather than singing about those specific moments. With the last line, he goes back to the “wish I could get to know you” stage.

He’s at that stage where you open their chat and read the texts you send to each other and start typing but then decide against it and close it and then repeat those steps ten thousand times a day. The warm feeling and the butterflies that come wih it.

Reminiscing about the relationship. A specific point in time, a domestic memory that makes him smile.

I think this part is so specific only the two people involved in the relationship would understand it. He’s pulling specific memories and situations. It’s someting so sacred and so about the two of them, that it’d be a disservice to try to imagine a scene around it.

I don’t think this was supposed to be “shade” or a callback to the gallery moment from Cherry. Harry likes art a lot and often goes to galleries. I think it’s just showing his appreciation for his lover with a familiar metaphor.

And we finally get to the part where he tells us he’s reminiscing. After going back and forth between moments where they’d just met and were getting to know each other, where they were together and in love and enjoying each other. Now the relationship (”your flowers”) has died.

What makes this song so genius is the metaphor of a SUNFLOWER specifically. Sunflower seeds grow in the centre of the flower head, and when the flower dies, you get the seeds:

“Plant new seeds in the melody” - he’s telling us that while his relationship has died, something’s come from it. He planted its seeds in a melody, which sprouted songs, an album. Full of his feelings and his experiences and himself. His art. The relationship is dead but a new melody has blossomed from it.

The sunflowers, the relationship, died. But he’s at a point where he’s happy. He keeps it “sweet in his memory”. After all the pain (what he saw coming in Golden, the suffering from Cherry, the heartwrenching agony from Falling, the bitterness from To Be So Lonely), he’s able to rise from it and think back on that relationship in a positive light, and he’s asking his lover to do the same.

theforum: Welcome to the very first show. @Harry_Styles #FineLineLive