anonymous September 20th, 2007 06:35PM  
The mistress could be a person, but personally this song has always reminded me of a guy on drugs. For drug users, the substance becomes their lover/mistress, their lives revolve around it. First it comforts them, we could call it the "honeymoon". It makes them happy. But soon it becomes a nightmare, when they realise they can't live without it. The mistress has become an enemy, it takes away everything they have: job, money, home, relationship, friends, health, etc. ("Poisoning the world for me
Take away my everything
Weakened as I am".) They know they are ruining their lives, but they continue, even if they swear it's the last time ("give me another moment from which I cannot awaken"). And even if they ever manage to quit, relapse is very common, sometimes replacing a drug by another ("falling again for another mistress of burden to idolize").

erinw88 May 1st, 2008 03:27AM  
According to David, this song "Describes the new tragedy of our lives, that even if we find love, the life we have chosen does not seem to want to let us keep it." It's a slightly similar meaning to Guarded.

MattXRush December 21st, 2008 10:20PM  
Well my personal interpretation is that I get the feeling it is about a girl and not drugs. Seems as if he may have fallen in love with his girlfriend and she may not feel the same way yet. He can see how its tearing him apart because its all he thinks about. He feels as if he cares about her more then she cares about him. And he wants her to open up to him.

MetalMaiden13 March 9th, 2009 08:11PM  
This song is about a country, specifically Israel. Although I could be wrong, but I doubt it. He is referring to Israel as female also done with ships.
If anyone has seen them live he waves that flag with a BIG star of David on it, hard to miss it! Longs for the place he loves the most but can't reach it, because of the current circumstances in that area so, he settles for other places like the USA, hence the term Mistress.

I would say David is privy to special treatment since most of the music biz is run by Jews (Zionists specifically). Here is some of David's history:

After attending Yeshiva High School at the Wisconsin Institute for Torah Study in Milwaukee, the Fasman Yeshiva High School and Ida Crown Jewish Academy in Chicago, and Valley Torah High School in North Hollywood, California, he spent the 1991-1992 academic year at the Neveh Zion Yeshiva in Telz-Stone, Jerusalem.
Draiman then triple majored in Business Administration, Philosophy, and Political Science at Loyola University Chicago and seriously thought about going to law school
before joining the band.