Melanie Martinez’s “Womb” Lyrics Meaning
“Womb” is the 13th and closing track of the standard edition Melanie Martinez’s full-length, “Portals”, as of its release on 31 March 2023. This project is backed by Atlantic Records, the label also responsible for her previous studio albums, “Cry Baby” (2015) and “K-12” (2019).
Besides for Martinez, this track was written by hitmaker Omer Fedi, being his only contribution to “Portals”. Meanwhile, the producer of the LP is CJ Baran.
Lyrics of “Womb”
In a manner of speaking, “Womb” is arguably the most-literal song found on “Portals”. As commonly understood, the womb is the part of a woman’s body where a fetus develops until the point that it is ready to come out into the world. And likewise we find the vocalist, most simply interpreted, taking on the role of such a person, i.e. a fetus.
Or more specifically, Martinez harps back to her thought processes when she was inside her mother’s body and leading up to her birth. Practically speaking, no one can actually recall their thoughts from such an early stage in life. So this outing is more or less fantastical or poetic anyway.
For instance, in the first verse Melanie, as a fetus, gives a shoutout to her yet-to-born younger brother (who, by the way, went on to become Joseph Martinez). It can also be gleaned, in whole as far as this song is concerned, that she is using the opportunity to acknowledge her mother, Mery Martinez, for going through the painful ordeal of childbirth in delivering her.
“In the womb get me out now, safe and I’m sound
Cut the cord, I’m coming
Out the blue, belly water too, hot and cold
Through with it, oh, now she’s birthing
Feeling alive, the closer that I get to my life
I’m pushing out the center, the core
I’m swimming through the flower no more, no more”
Again, no one can remember what they were actually thinking when they came into the world, but the experience in general tends to be the same for all of us, i.e. coming out of the womb “kicking [and] screaming”, as the vocalist recounts in the second verse.
And along those lines, as envisioned, the fetus that Melanie is portraying was very much looking forward to being set free on her own. But once the event actually transpired, i.e. her mother birthing her, the immediate, natural reaction is fear.
So conclusively, it can be said that “Womb” is both literal and symbolic. Literally when we are developing inside of our mothers, “safe and… sound” inside their wombs, there does come a point when we ‘push’ ourselves “out”, growing impatient in terms of actually seeing the world ourselves, if you will. And with that thought in mind, what these lyrics also represent is how fetuses are actually looking forward to being born.
Or put otherwise, the goal of pregnancy is not for the child to remain inside the woman’s womb indefinitely. Rather, by design, there reaches a point where the child inside must be set free.
Martinez talks about “Womb”
According to Martinez, despite this song being one of the first songs she wrote for her “Portals” album, she knew from the beginning that she wanted “Portals” to end with this song.
She further revealed that the song is written from “perspective of entering a new lifetime—the nerves and excitement that arises when you’re about to let your human experience on earth move your progression forward.”
