Songfacts®:

• A band composition, this poignant song records the thoughts of someone who is hesitant but open to the possibility of loving again after losing someone very dear: "Don't let her see you crying." We're never told what happened to the previous love, but it seems very likely she has died or at the very least is now far away: "She'll always be with me."
• This is one of those Genesis songs that sounds like it might be a Phil Collins solo effort. "I can understand why people say that, but in a way I resent it because it's very much my chord sequence," keyboard player Tony Banks said in the Way We Walk DVD. "The reason why it sound like Phil a bit is because there are certain kind of chords that I went to because his voice sounds good over them. I put them together in a particular kind of way that I thought was quite attractive."
  
  Banks added in a Songfacts interview: "I used to get a look from Mike or Phil and they'd say, 'You've gone too far this time.' But, I would try to slip a few things in without them noticing. Even a simple song like 'Hold On My Heart,' the opening chords are pretty exotic, actually, and I crept those in without them really noticing what was happening."
• Tony Banks embraces unusual sounds that could be considered mistakes by traditional standards. The opening chords of this song are an example, as he created some intentional discord. "I was playing a respectable chord, but putting the wrong bass note to it," he said. "You're desperate for it to resolve, and it finally does. Immediately you've got a song."
• The working title for this song was "Burt" because it had a Burt Bacharach feel when they were developing it.
• This was the only mellow song Genesis performed on their 1992 We Can't Dance tour. A recording from the tour is found on the live album from later that year: Live/The Way We Walk - Volume One - The Shorts.
• A dark and shadowy accompanying video shows the band performing the song in an empty nightclub. >>>

  Suggestion credit:
  Steve - Torrance, CA, for above 2