Un-Break My Heart
The Starlite Singers Lyrics

The lyrics of "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" by Tony Bennet, as sung by The Starlite Singers, is a heartfelt declaration of homecoming and belonging. The singer expresses a sense of loss and loneliness in the poetic opening lines, contrasting the loveliness of Paris with a gray sadness and mourning the glory of Rome as a thing of the past. The song builds on this melancholic note, with the singer reflecting on his own experience of being alone and forgotten in Manhattan. The longing and nostalgia of the song reach their apex when the singer declares that he left his heart in San Francisco and that it calls to him from high on a hill.

From the top of that hill, looking out over the city, the singer sees the beauty of San Francisco, with its famous cable cars that climb halfway to the stars. The singer's love is waiting for him there, above the "blue and windy sea", and the "morning fog may chill the air," but he doesn't care. In the final verse of the song, the climax of the singer's emotional journey, the singer proclaims that when he comes home to San Francisco, the city's "golden sun will shine" for him. It is in this city that he finds the sense of belonging and connection that he has been seeking all along.

Overall, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" is a beautifully evocative song that captures the poignant emotions of nostalgia, belonging, and love. The lyrics describe a sense of dislocation and loss that is resolved in the singer's homecoming to the city that he loves. The song provides a vivid portrait of San Francisco, with its iconic cable cars, blue sea, and captivating skyline, and celebrates the city as a place of renewal, redemption, and triumph over loneliness.