Beirut's "Cherbourg"

A couple days ago I listened to Beirut's The Flying Club Cup and noticed a couple things about the melody in the first phrase in "Cherbourg."  The lyrics are "And a fall from you is a long way down."  There's a melisma on "you" and between the two syllables, there's an interval of a fifth (A to D), which helps to musically represent the "fall."  The "long way down" is sung to a descending phrase (A, F#, E, E) in which the "way" has a F# to E melisma, so the "down-ness" is doubly emphasized.