Metaphor

I chose this song by David Cook titled, "A Daily Anthem" for my Metaphorical Criticism.   In examining the artifact in it's context, this song is sung by by an artist who won American Idol a few years ago.  His audience is broad, he is a pop/alternative/rock singer and would typically be reaching a teenagers to young adults.  This song is full of metaphors worthy of analysis, but I will choose a few to point out.
In the first line, "Break your neck for some substance" the tenor is 'some substance', and the vehicle or lens to view it in is 'break your neck', implying that whatever your substance is (you add your meaning here), it is worth breaking your neck for.  That type of sacrifice and would be large in the literal sense.  I relate this to training as an athlete.  Your lens of breaking your neck could be defined as long hours of training, painful sweat, time put into your sport etc.  The substance would be your sport.  The next part that says "So long to the ordinary day wrought with fictitious tales of how there's any other way" I would say the tenor is the ordinary day, and the vehicle is the fictitious tales of how there's any other way.  My perception of this is that once you have committed yourself as an athlete, (or whatever your substance) you have decided to sacrifice some things, maybe sleep, time with family, other hobbies, indulgent foods, etc.  For me, it's the mental aspect that I've had to change and focus on the positivity of allowing myself to go for my dreams without holding back, letting go of my limitations.   You have said goodbye to those things that would hold you back from achieving your goals, you have made that commitment and said goodbye to a previous way of living, acting, and thinking. 

There are many more metaphors throughout the song.  (For example:  half-baked blessings, a gentle undercurrent of more years to grow old, etc)

This song inspires me.  Even the title says it all for me, because I have to commit daily to who and what I want to become.  Regardless of all the things I COULD be in this life.  I get to decide for me what I want.  It's different for us all.

  The meaning I put to this is that it's the daily decisions to take part in your own life's course and actually SING YOUR OWN SONG, at the TOP OF YOUR LUNGS, internalizing and accepting your own course of action and sharing it with the world.

"A Daily AntheM"

Break your neck for some substance
This is temporary sanity, an exercise in vanity
So long to the ordinary day wrought with fictitious tales
of how there's any other way
Hold on to anything at all
It's a long way down between the summer and the fall
If I told you that you're everything,
Would you sing along?
Would you sing along?

It's a daily anthem
Would you sing my song,
At the top of your lungs?
And we'll all sing along,
We'll all sing along

It's a half-baked blessing
For the lessons I've learned,
Never deserved.
And we'll all sing along,
Oh we'll all sing along

Now the verses take hold,
A gentle undercurrent of more years to grow old
Say goodbye to the cold
And try to forgive everything this night.

As we sing your daily anthem,
Would you sing my song,
At the top of your lungs?
And we'll all sing along,
We'll all sing along

It's a half-baked blessing
For the lessons I've learned,
Never deserved.
And we'll all sing along,
We'll all sing along