“Ocean Meadows” is one of those songs where the lyrics are deceptively simple, yet quietly loaded with meaning. The imagery itself is a contradiction—there are no meadows in the ocean. Is it satire? Is it a wishful imagining, as if meadows really could exist beneath the waves? Or is it simply a symbolic pairing meant to spark your own interpretation? That’s for you to decide.
What is clear, however, is that there is a “space.” It’s a healthy reminder to make space for others—something the world so often refuses to do, whether in physical, emotional, or even digital realms like social media and YouTube. Sometimes, it’s not strangers who deny space, but family. To me, if anything, the song means that I would make space for you, even when others would not. Perhaps the strange pairing of “ocean” and “meadows” underscores the hypocrisy of the way the world can be—how people and systems refuse what should be basic rights.
I’m reminded of the well-known story about the most prominent religious figure in history, Jesus—how there was no space for his birth at the inn, and he was instead delivered in a stable, placed in a manger. Not to come across as overly religious here, but simply as an analogy: even in a world that should have made room, there wasn’t, and yet a place was still made.
And just as man came into the world nearly lacking space, so might one leave it the same way—the ocean itself making space for ashes carried off into it, as if the ocean of meadows bears a space like a grave.
So whether “Ocean Meadows” makes you picture something real, impossible, or deeply personal, its simplicity holds room for your own meaning. That space is there—if you want it.
—Josh Montague
Lyrics:
Like the meadows in the ocean
like the meadows in the ocean
there’s a space
there’s a space
Like the meadows in the ocean
like the meadows in the ocean
there’s a space
for your name
Socials:
Website – thejoshworld.com
YouTube – @thejoshworldme
TikTok – @thejoshworldme
X (Twitter) – @theJoshWorld
Leave a Reply