Stabat Mater
Rafo Ráez Lyrics

The lyrics of Rafo Ráez's song "Stabat Mater" paint a raw and emotional picture of a woman going through the agony of childbirth. The first stanza talks about her waiting in a police station, where she is mocked by the sergeant, as she is in labor and awaiting medical attention. The second stanza talks about her enduring a painful and invasive medical examination by the doctors. The third stanza is particularly gut-wrenching, as it describes her as being "disemboweled" and at the mercy of drowsy midwives. The chorus repeatedly uses the phrase "Stabat Mater," which refers to the Latin hymn about Mary standing at the foot of the cross as Jesus died; this alludes to the woman's suffering as a kind of sacrifice.

In the second half of the song, the focus shifts to the aftermath of the childbirth. The woman is alone in the night, and we also see her standing in front of store windows on Mother's Day, perhaps longing for the child that she has lost. The line "Stabat Mater once veces Dolorosa" (Stabat Mater eleven times painful) is a reference to the eleven added stanzas in the later versions of the hymn, which describe Mary's suffering in detail. Finally, the woman hears a voice telling her not to cry anymore, as her child has been taken up to heaven as an angel. The whole song is a powerful meditation on the pain and sacrifice of motherhood, as well as the universal experience of grief and loss.