"The Willing Well I: Fuel for the Feeding End"

Album Art by Christopher Shy.

### Appears on

*Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV - Volume One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness*

### Mastering

Brian Gardner

**"The Willing Well I: Fuel for the Feeding End"** is a song by the American rock band Coheed and Cambria. It is the twelfth song on their 2005 album *Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV - Volume One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness*. This is the first part of The Willing Well suite. A demo version exists on the *GAIBSIV Demos* cassette.

## Lyrics

**[Verse 1]**

Is this what I wish for those and all they know?

Could depend on how coward I should act

*(From hell or does come it from within?)*

If she won't give me the love I came here for

With pen, I am armed here to react

**[Chorus]**

Hey now, hey now, what is it, boy?

All the things that trouble you

So visit your mirror image

Of what might have once behaved

Hey now, hey now, what is it, boy?

But I won't rest till dead, till dead do you part

**[Verse 2]**

This is how I feel my God from what's been dealt

The flies that flutter fight tonight

*(From hell or does come it from within?)*

Is it love that I'm feeling or is this hate the same?

The emotion's enough to kill the sane

**[Chorus]**

Hey now, hey now, what is it, boy?

All the things that trouble you

So visit your mirror image

Of what might have once behaved

Hey now, hey now, what is it, boy?

Besides, I only hope you know that I love you

Oh, I hope

**[Bridge 1]**

Feed, little maggots, off the west side of your sin

Run, little maggot, when they learn of what you did

Feed, little maggots, off the west side of your sin

Run little maggot, when they learn of what you did

**[Interlude]**

*Feliz sería a qué hora*

*Feliz sería a qué hora*

*Feliz sería a qué hora*

*Feliz sería a qué hora*

**[Bridge 2]**

From start to finish, I've made you feel this

Discomfort in turn, with the world you've learned

To love through this hate, to live with its weight

A burden discerned in the blood you taste

Why would you deny me answers?

If I'm just a boy on the brink of being

Horror and hell through its fires

Be brutally honest, was it better before me?

In the curve of your body

How I want, how I want her with me

The truth of the story

The Vishual, I wish you all

**[Bridge 3]**

The better end of all to come

The truth be now here, one by one

I am to you, extend to none

The memory that fuels the fire

**[Verse 3]**

Watching his tale with the words he unfolds

Conscience and cold, we'd never know

They scream as he laughs off the dust from his eyes

These words will now learn of the dreams in his mind

**[Pre-Chorus]**

Could this be that hard for me?

To configure a new love in hate

To my new entity, or banish it home to the grave

No one is safe

**[Verse 4]**

With the quickness strike out, for the less of us doubt

The mercy of the man who put the pen in our mouth

Word write us well, signed, "Forgiveness for sale"

I'm through being full of all the might you want killed

The Fiction will see The Real

The answer will question still

In your body and blood, as your parents once wept

You will follow their lead, one by one, every step

**[Pre-Chorus]**

Could this be that hard for me?

To configure a new love and paint

To my new entity, or banish it home to the grave

I will not save

**[Outro]**

Your world

Your world, in the end, and you

Your world

Your world...

## Story Context

In this song, Ryder the Writer has officially crossed over to the Fiction and intends to kill Ambellina. The first verse reflects this with lines like, "If she won't give me the love I came here for / With pen, I am armed here to react."

The chorus depicts his encounter with Claudio when he arrives to do this. He says, "All the things that trouble you" referring to Claudio's indecision due to the losses in his life (his family, his girlfriend, and even his friends, like Cecil the Star). When Claudio pursues the Writer through the Well to save Ambellina, he encounters a vision the Writer has of a younger him breaking up with a different girl in what seems to be the city of Paris (the real Paris on planet Earth, not the planet Paris:Earth). This is what the lines "So visit your mirror image / Of what might have once behaved" are meant to convey. Of course, that was different version of him—he is not that person anymore. "I won't rest 'til dead, 'til dead do you part" just confirms his conviction to eliminate Ambellina from the story.

In Verse 2, Ryder is still rationalizing his decision and revealing he is still under delusions that he can't seem to fight off (apparent in the line "Is it love that I'm feeling or is this hate the same?"). But it doesn't really matter, because at the end of the day his emotions are so wild that he can do the deed he came to accomplish.

The bridge shows how the Writer is shifting between The Fiction (plural maggots who have sinned) and The Real (single maggot, Erica, who is the catalyst). The interlude, which is in Spanish and is sung in an upbeat manner, probably contributes to the idea that the Writer has lost it, since it translates to "Happiness would be at what time?" or more simply, "When will I be happy?"

In the second bridge, we get a bit of a conversation between Ryder and Claudio. In the first bit, Ryder is scolding him: "All that's happened to you has been by my design, and though they haven't all been pleasant, you've learned, you've loved—felt the entire scope of feelings—and have continued to live, as big a burden as that is. But Claudio, who is fresh with grief, is not happy with that. He yells, "I was just a boy, just beginning to live, and you put me through all this pain and grief... how could any of it have been good, even for you? To which Ryder, caught up in his own world, has moved on from Claudio, and has become preoccupied with Erica again. He reiterates that she is the reason he's made the story in the first place (which reinforces the idea that she is the Mother of the story, if he is the father.)

The third bridge takes on a happier tone again as we switch gears. Ryder begins foreshadowing and speaking cryptically. "The better end" seems to refer to the end of the story, but why and what is the *better* one? The line, "The truth be now here, one by one" is laced in Christian imagery, such as "the truth" usually referring to Jesus. The third line seems to be an analogy: I am to You as Extend is to None would seem to mean, simply, that Ryder is everything and "his characters" are nothing. The last line may be yet another call back to Erica and the memories Ryder shares with her being the fuel for his obsession with the story.

Verse 3, based on the tone, seems to take us out of Ryder's fantastical thoughts and back into the actual story. These lines seem to describe Ryder from a third party's perspective, but it's a bit unclear who is making the observation. It's probably Claudio as, Ryder now having disappeared, surveys the scene before him and sees Wilhelm Ryan. He is all-powerful and still believes everything is going according to his own plan—his own dream.

In the pre-chorus here, Claudio laments Ambellina's loss, especially as he was just accepting his love for her and getting over Newo. He is full of rage and sorrow and wonders if it's okay to use that to become the Crowing.

In Verse 4, we see things from Ryan's perspective. He's released his flies who are doing his bidding, transforming any and all persons into monstrosities. He has no love for the Writer, whom he witnessed spiriting away his enemies, but still believes he is better than him and challenges him: Make me weak, if you can; make me seek forgiveness. Then, convinced of his greatness, he makes an observation: the creatures have seen God, but does it change anything? And makes a prediction: Claudio is still the Son of Three, and he will follow in his parents footsteps, all the way to their death.

But of course, as the Writer, Ryder must have the last word. He, like Claudio, wonders if he can truly move on (from Erica and from the story), if he can throw away the history that made him Him. But he does believe Claudio will fulfill his "destiny" to destroy Star IV and thus all of Heaven's Fence. And he welcomes it.

## Trivia

* Though Sanchez is of Puerto Rican descent, he has never used Spanish in his songs; this is the first one.
* According to Sanchez, the simple explanation of this song is: "The Willing Well is where the two worlds collide. It’s from the Writer’s perspective: ‘She won’t give me the love I came here for/ With pen I am armed, here to react.’ Then the second verse is from Ten Speed’s perspective. And it goes back and forth between the characters. The Vishual is Chase. She kind of knows about the Writer, but she thinks of him as God."
* Some changes were made from development:
	+ In the chorus before the bridge, the last two lines ("Besides, I only hope you know that I love you / Oh, I hope") weren't originally present.
	+ There was no interlude.
	+ In the outro, the line "Your world, in the end, and you" was just "Your world".

## References

1. ↑ Coheed and Cambria. Booklet. *Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV - Volume One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness*, Equal Vision Records, 2005.
2. ↑ https://genius.com/Coheed-and-cambria-the-willing-well-i-fuel-for-the-feeding-end-lyrics
3. ↑ https://translate.google.com/?sl=auto&tl=en&text=Feliz%20ser%C3%ADa%0Aa%20qu%C3%A9%20hora&op=translate
4. ↑ https://www.clevescene.com/scene-and-heard/archives/2007/10/24/coheed-decoded-coheed-and-cambria-frontman-recaps-his-sci-fi-epic