Temporary Ground - Intellectual

Jack sets the image of the environment that this song takes place. These “creatures” living on giant lily pads (possibly a metaphor for earth) living their lives.

Note that it also says “temporary creatures”, implying that these creatures are only their for a certain amount of time. This could be reference to the dinosaurs living in the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods and the mass extinction of them.

These creatures call out to other for help, but no one hears them or sees them moving. A classic example of “if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”

Jack was doing some reading about these giant lily-pads that could hold up to 100 pounds. That is where he got the idea of a “lily island.”

The homes of these creatures are in risking of being destroyed, possibly via an earthquake or a meteoroid. The inhabitants just want to live in their homes without this risk, but mother nature has other plans.

Teleport a million years later, humans emerge and discover things that are just common knowledge, but may have found a different reasoning behind what happened before them.

Unlike on “Lazaretto”, Jack seems to be talking about a literal God here.

God supposedly made the world for us to live in, but none of us have any true security.

Arcade Fire offer up a similar sentiment on “Sprawl I (Flatland):

The last defender of the sprawl,
Said “Well, where do you kids live?”
Well, sir, if you only knew what the answer’s worth
I’ve been searching every corner of the earth

Every creature has it rough now, with humans killing other humans, animals killing other animals, humans killing animals and animals killing humans. Despite all this chaos, people often look towards God for sort of an enlightenment or reasoning for all this.