Was ich liebe

The speaker distrusts happiness and love because they seem to lead inevitably to pain. Rather than risk loss, the speaker tries to reject affection and even suppress joy. The emotional movement is circular: a wish to protect oneself from suffering becomes a bleak belief that anything loved is doomed.

“Must pay” for everything beautiful suggests that pleasure comes with a cost, perhaps later regret or grief. The idea that someone who loves the speaker “goes under” implies that love may harm not only the speaker but also the person who cares for them. “I don’t like that I like something” shows how deeply the speaker resists their own feelings.

The lyrics can be read as the voice of someone convinced that happiness cannot last, or as an exaggerated expression of fear and self-sabotage. The repeated claims that loved things must perish sound absolute, but they may reveal the speaker’s anxious expectations rather than an objective truth. The song leaves open whether rejecting love feels like protection or another kind of suffering.