The different meanings of water in Madonna songs.

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One of the first elements, water has always been present throughout Madonna's career, both in her songs and her videos, every time with a different meaning.
Today I want to discuss this topic using three "aquatic" songs by Madonna as examples.
Let's get into this article!

RAIN

Let's start with one of the most beloved ballads of our Diva's career: Rain.

In this song water could have two different meanings, it's up to you to decide what the metaphor means. The first interpretation identifies water with love, a purifying force that takes away sorrow and pain, while bringing hope for the future. The lines "Rain is what this thunder brings / for the first time I can hear my heart sing" and "I'm gonna stand out here on the mountain top/ 'till I feel your / rain" create beautiful and vivid spiritual images as well.
The second interpretation is more carnal, as the whole Erotica album plays with double entendres.
This time, the song is about sex and water/rain refers to an orgasm.
I personally don't share this second explanation but some music critics are that naughty, what can we do?

WASH ALL OVER ME

This gorgeous ballad is about realization and resignation. Madonna feels like a big change is coming ("Torn between the impulse to stay or running away from all this madness") and she is going to welcome it and accept the start of a new era:
"Who am I 
to decide what should be done?
If this is the end then let it come
Let it come
Let it rain
Rain all over me
Like the tide, let it flow
Let it wash all over me"
This time water does not necessarily have a positive meaning, as it symbolizes change. Who knows how this upcoming new era will affect the world? Many times in history society has evolved and each individual has reacted differently.
This song has always reminded me of the iconic painting "The Great Wave Off Kanagawa" by Japanese painter Katsushika Hokusai. If we take the lyrics of the song literally there are a couple of coincidences and analogies between it and the painting. The tidal wave sweeping away the fishing boats (the big change inevitably taking down unprepared people) and Mount Fiji in the background, the highest in Japan, almost acting like a solemn guardian ("From the Tower of Babylon, where nothing is what is seems / gonna watch the sun going down"). The song and the painting both present a tidal wave and a majestic entity observing from above.

SWIM 

This time Madonna sings about the sins of humanity and how we should find ourselves again to start all over. 

The ocean once again acts like a purifying medium and also a portal to a new beginning: "So that we can begin again / wash away all our sins / crash to the other shore". 

In Kabbalah, water also symbolizes mercy, a trait we lose more and more as we grow older, both individually and as a global society: "Children killing children while / the students rape their teachers / comets fly across the sky / while the churches burn their preachers". The act of swimming in the ocean means reuniting with our lost innocence. 

Some people also think water is actually a metaphor for death in this song, as the latter is considered by different cultures a road to a higher consciousness. 

Let your body move to the music.