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I was walking in New York City and I brushed up against the man in front of
me. I felt a cardboard placard on his back. And when we passed a
streetlight, I could read it, it said ``Please don't pass me by -- I am
blind, but you can see -- I've been blinded totally -- Please don't pass me
by.'' I was walking along 7th Avenue, when I came to 14th Street I saw on
the corner curious mutilations of the human form; it was a school for
handicapped people. And there were cripples, and people in wheelchairs and
crutches and it was snowing, and I got this sense that the whole city was
singing this:
Oh please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh please don't pass me by.
And you know as I was walking I thought it was them who were singing it, I
thought it was they who were singing it, I thought it was the other who was
singing it, I thought it was someone else. But as I moved along I knew it
was me, and that I was singing it to myself. It went:
Please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
well, I've been blinded totally,
oh please don't pass me by.
Oh please don't pass me by.
Now I know that you're sitting there deep in your velvet seats and you're
thinking ``Uh, he's up there saying something that he thinks about, but I'll
never have to sing that song.'' But I promise you friends, that you're going
to be singing this song: it may not be tonight, it may not be tomorrow, but
one day you'll be on your knees and I want you to know the words when the
time comes. Because you're going to have to sing it to yourself, or to
another, or to your brother. You're going to have to learn to sing this
song, it goes:
Please don't pass me by,
ah, you don't have to sing this... not for you.
Please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh please don't pass me by.
Well I sing this for the Jews and the Gypsies and the smoke that they made.
And I sing this for the children of England, their faces so grave. And I
sing this for a saviour with no one to save. Hey, won't you be naked for
me? Hey, won't you be naked for me? It goes:
Please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh now, please don't pass me by.
Now there's nothing that I tell you that will help you connect the blood
tortured night with the day that comes next. But I want it to hurt you, I
want it to end. Oh, won't you be naked for me? Oh now:
Please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
but I've been blinded totally,
oh, please don't pass me by.
Well I sing this song for you Blonde Beasts, I sing this song for you
Venuses upon your shells on the foam of the sea. And I sing this for the
freaks and the cripples, and the hunchback, and the burned, and the
burning, and the maimed, and the broken, and the torn, and all of those
that you talk about at the coffee tables, at the meetings, and the
demonstrations, on the streets, in your music, in my songs. I mean the real
ones that are burning, I mean the real ones that are burning
I say, please don't pass me by,
oh now, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yeah but you can see,
ah now, I've been blinded totally,
oh no, please don't pass me by.
I know that you still think that its me. I know that you think that there's
somebody else. I know that these words aren't yours. But I tell you friends
that one day
You're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down...
Oh, please don't pass me by,
oh, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yeah but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh, please don't pass me by.
Well you know I have my songs and I have my poems. I have my book and I
have the army, and sometimes I have your applause. I make some money, but
you know what my friends, I'm still out there on the corner. I'm with the
freaks, I'm with the hunted, I'm with the maimed, yes, I'm with the torn,
I'm with the down, I'm with the poor. Come on now...
Ah, please don't pass me by,
well I've got to go now friends,
but, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yeah but you can see,
oh, I've been blinded, I've been blinded totally,
oh now, please don't pass me by.
Now I want to take away my dignity, yes take my dignity, my friends, take
my dignity, take my form, take my style, take my honour, take my courage,
take my time, take my time, take my time... 'Cause you know I'm with you
singing this song. And I wish you would, I wish you would, I wish you would
go home with someone else. Wish you'd go home with someone else. I wish
you'd go home with someone else. Don't be the person that you came with.
Oh, don't be the person that you came with, Oh don't be the person that you
came with. Ah, I'm not going to be. I can't stand him. I can't stand who I
am. That's why I've got to get down on my knees. Because I can't make it by
myself. I'm not by myself anymore because the man I was before he was a
tyrant, he was a slave, he was in chains, he was broken and then he sang:
Oh, please don't pass me by,
oh, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yes I am blind, Oh but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh, please don't pass me by.
Well I hope I see you out there on the corner. Yeah I hope as I go by that
I hear you whisper with the breeze. Because I'm going to leave you now, I'm
going to find me someone new. Find someone knew.
And please don't pass me by.
Sometimes I find I get to thinking of the past.
We swore to each other that our love would surely last.
You kept right on loving, I went on a fast,
now I am too thin and your love is too vast.
But I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
Well, I choose the rooms that I live in with care,
the windows are small and the walls almost bare,
there's only got one bed and there's only got one prayer;
I listen all night for your step on the stair.
But I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight, tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
Oh, sometimes I see her undressing for me,
she's the soft naked lady that love meant her to be
and she's moving her body so brave and so free.
If I've got to remember that's a fine memory.
And I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight, tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
Ah, I looked into the mirrors in numberous places
They all smile back at me with their troublous (?) faces
And the car that they delt me...(?)
And the horses to me at the races.
But I know from your eyes
and I know from her your (?) little smile
that tonight, tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
There's still one or two of us walking the street
No arrows or directions...(?) under their feet
No angels...(?) away from the...(?)
And no...(?)
But I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
And I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
(A Cohen poem set to music)
Queen Victoria,
My father and all his tobacco loved you,
I love you too in all your forms,
the slim and lovely virgin floating among German beer,
the mean governess of the huge pink maps,
the solitary mourner of a prince.
Queen Victoria,
I am cold and rainy,
I am dirty as a glass roof in a train station,
I feel like an empty cast iron exhibition,
I want ornaments on everything,
because my love, she gone with other boys.
Queen Victoria,
do you have a punishment under the white lace,
will you be short with her, will you make her read those little Bibles,
will you spank her with a mechanical corset.
I want her pure as power, I want her skin slightly musty with petticoats
will you wash the easy bidet out of her head?
Queen Victoria,
I'm not much nourished by modern love,
will you come into my life
with your sorrow and your black carriages,
And your perfect
memories.
Queen Victoria,
the Twentieth Century belongs to you and me.
Let us be two severe giants not less lonely for our partnership,
who discolour test tubes in the halls of Science,
who turn up unwelcome at every World's Fair,
heavy with proverbs and corrections,
confusing the star-dazed tourists
with our incomparable sense of loss.
You were the promise at dawn,
I was the morning after.
You were Jesus Christ my Lord,
I was the money lender.
You were the sensitive woman,
I was the very reverend Freud.
You were the manual orgasm,
I was the dirty little boy.
And is this what you wanted
to live in a house that is haunted
by the ghost of you and me?
Is this what you wanted...
You were Marlon Brando,
I was Steve McQueen.
You were K.Y. Jelly,
I was Vaseline.
You were the father of modern medicine,
I was Mr. Clean.
You where the whore and the beast of Babylon,
I was Rin Tin Tin.
And is this what you wanted...
And is this what you wanted...
You got old and wrinkled,
I stayed seventeen.
You lusted after so many,
I lay here with one.
You defied your solitude,
I came through alone.
You said you could never love me,
I undid your gown.
And is this what you wanted...
And is this what you wanted...
I mean is this what you wanted...
That's right, is this what you wanted...
I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel,
you were talking so brave and so sweet,
giving me head on the unmade bed,
while the limousines wait in the street.
Those were the reasons and that was New York,
we were running for the money and the flesh.
And that was called love for the workers in song
probably still is for those of them left.
Ah but you got away, didn't you babe,
you just turned your back on the crowd,
you got away, I never once heard you say,
I need you, I don't need you,
I need you, I don't need you
and all of that jiving around.
I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel,
you were famous, your heart was a legend.
You told me again you preferred handsome men
but for me you would make an exception.
And clenching your fist for the ones like us
who are oppressed by the figures of beauty,
you fixed yourself, you said, ``Well never mind,
we are ugly but we have the music.''
And then you got away, didn't you babe...
I don't mean to suggest that I loved you the best,
I can't keep track of each fallen robin.
I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel,
that's all, I don't even think of you that often.
I asked my father,
I said, ``Father change my name.''
The one I'm using now it's covered up
with fear and filth and cowardice and shame.
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
He said, ``I locked you in this body,
I meant it as a kind of trial.
You can use it for a weapon,
or to make some woman smile.''
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
``Then let me start again,'' I cried,
``please let me start again,
I want a face that's fair this time,
I want a spirit that is calm.''
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
``I never turned aside,'' he said,
``I never walked away.
It was you who built the temple,
it was you who covered up my face.''
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
And may the spirit of this song,
may it rise up pure and free.
May it be a shield for you,
a shield against the enemy.
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
Field Commander Cohen,
he was our most important spy.
Wounded in the line of duty,
parachuting acid into
diplomatic cocktail parties,
urging Fidel Castro to
abandon fields and castles.
Leave it all and like a man,
come back to nothing special,
such as waiting rooms
and ticket lines,
silver bullet suicides,
and messianic ocean tides,
and racial roller-coaster rides
and other forms of boredom advertised as poetry.
I know you need your sleep now,
I know your life's been hard.
But many men are falling,
where you promised to stand guard.
I never asked but I heard
you cast your lot along with the poor.
But then I overheard your prayer,
that you be this and nothing more
than just some grateful faithful woman's
favourite singing millionaire,
the patron Saint of envy and the grocer of despair,
working for the Yankee Dollar.
I know you need your sleep now...
Ah, lover come and lie with me,
if my lover is who you are,
and be your sweetest self awhile
until I ask for more, my child.
Then let the other selves be wrong,
yeah, let them manifest and come
till every taste is on the tongue,
till love is pierced and love is hung,
and every kind of freedom done, then oh,
oh my love, oh my love, oh my love,
oh my love, oh my love, oh my love.
Why don't you try to do without him?
Why don't you try to live alone?
Do you really need his hands for your passion?
Do you really need his heart for your throne?
Do you need his label for your baby?
Do you need his beast for the bone?
Do you need to hold a leash to be a lady?
I know you're going to make, make it on your own.
Why don't your try to forget him?
Just open up your dainty little hand.
You know this life is filled with many sweet companions,
many satisfying one-night stands.
Do you want to be the ditch around a tower?
Do you want to be the moonlight in his cave?
Do you want to give your blessing to his power
as he goes whistling past his daddy,
past his daddy's grave.
I'd like to take you take you to the ceremony,
well, that is if I remember the way.
You see Jack and Jill they're going to join their misery,
I'm afraid it's time for everyone to pray.
You can see they've finally taken cover,
they're willing, yeah they're willing to obey.
Their vows are difficult, they're for each other,
so let nobody put a loophole, a loophole in their way.
There is a war between the rich and poor,
a war between the man and the woman.
There is a war between the ones who say there is a war
and the ones who say there isn't.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
that's right, get in it,
why don't you come on back to the war,
it's just beginning.
Well I live here with a woman and a child,
the situation makes me kind of nervous.
Yes, I rise up from her arms,
she says ``I guess you call this love'';
I call it service.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
don't be a tourist,
why don't you come on back to the war,
before it hurts us,
why don't you come on back to the war,
let's all get nervous.
You cannot stand what I've become,
you much prefer the gentleman I was before.
I was so easy to defeat, I was so easy to control,
I didn't even know there was a war.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
don't be embarrassed,
why don't you come on back to the war,
you can still get married.
There is a war between the rich and poor,
a war between the man and the woman.
There is a war between the left and right,
a war between the black and white,
a war between the odd and the even.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
pick up your tiny burden,
why don't you come on back to the war,
let's all get even,
why don't you come on back to the war,
can't you hear me speaking?
Now the courtroom is quiet, but who will confess.
Is it true you betrayed us? The answer is Yes.
Then read me the list of the crimes that are mine,
I will ask for the mercy that you love to decline.
And all the ladies go moist, and the judge has no choice,
a singer must die for the lie in his voice.
And I thank you, I thank you for doing your duty,
you keepers of truth, you guardians of beauty.
Your vision is right, my vision is wrong,
I'm sorry for smudging the air with my song.
Lalala...
Oh, the night it is thick, my defences are hid
in the clothes of a woman I would like to forgive,
in the rings of her silk, in the hinge of her thighs,
where I have to go begging in beauty's disguise.
Oh goodnight, goodnight, my night after night,
my night after night, after night,
after night, after night, after night.
I am so afraid that I listen to you,
your sun glassed protectors they do that to you.
It's their ways to detain, their ways to disgrace,
their knee in your balls and their fist in your face.
Yes and long live the state by whoever it's made,
sir, I didn't see nothing, I was just getting home late.
Lalala...
I tried to leave you, I don't deny
I closed the book on us, at least a hundred times.
I'd wake up every morning by your side.
The years go by, you lose your pride.
The baby's crying, so you do not go outside,
and all your work it's right before your eyes.
Goodnight, my darling, I hope you're satisfied,
the bed is kind of narrow, but my arms are open wide.
And here's a man still working for your smile.
And who by fire, who by water,
who in the sunshine, who in the night time,
who by high ordeal, who by common trial,
who in your merry merry month of may,
who by very slow decay,
and who shall I say is calling?
And who in her lonely slip, who by barbiturate,
who in these realms of love, who by something blunt,
and who by avalanche, who by powder,
who for his greed, who for his hunger,
and who shall I say is calling?
And who by brave assent, who by accident,
who in solitude, who in this mirror,
who by his lady's command, who by his own hand,
who in mortal chains, who in power,
and who shall I say is calling?
Many men have loved the bells
you fastened to the rein,
and everyone who wanted you
they found what they will always want again.
Your beauty lost to you yourself
just as it was lost to them.
Oh take this longing from my tongue,
whatever useless things these hands have done.
Let me see your beauty broken down,
like you would do for one you love.
Your body like a searchlight
my poverty revealed,
I would like to try your charity
until you cry, ``Now you must try my greed.''
And everything depends upon
how near you sleep to me,
Just take this longing from my tongue,
all the lonely things my hands have done.
Let me see your beauty broken down,
like you would do for one your love.
Hungry as an archway
through which the troops have passed,
I stand in ruins behind you,
with your winter clothes, your broken sandal straps.
I love to see you naked over there
especially from the back.
Oh take this longing from my tongue,
all the useless things my hands have done,
untie for me your hired blue gown,
like you would do for one that you love.
You're faithful to the better man,
I'm afraid that he left.
So let me judge your love affair
in this very room where I have sentenced mine to death.
I'll even wear these old laurel leaves
that he's shaken from his head.
Just take this longing from my tongue,
all the useless things my hands have done,
let me see your beauty broken down,
like you would do for one you love.
Like you would do for one you love.
Alas, my love, you did me wrong,
to cast me out discourteously,
for I have loved you so long,
delighting in your very company.
Now if you intend to show me disdain,
don't you know it all the more enraptures me,
for even so I still remain your lover in captivity.
Green sleeves, you're all alone,
the leaves have fallen, the men have gone.
Green sleeves, there's no one home,
not even the Lady Green Sleeves.
I sang my songs, I told my lies,
to lie between your matchless thighs.
And ain't it fine, ain't it wild
to finally end our exercise.
Then I saw you naked in the early dawn,
oh, I hoped you would be someone new.
I reached for you but you were gone,
so lady I'm going too.
Green sleeves, you're all alone,
the leaves have fallen, the men have gone.
Green sleeves, there's no one home,
not even the Lady Green Sleeves.
Green sleeves, you're all alone,
the leaves have fallen, the men have all gone home.
Green sleeves, it's so easily done,
leaving the Lady Green Sleeves.
All songs by Phil Spector and Leonard Cohen.
As the mist leaves no scar
On the dark green hill
So my body leaves no scar
On you and never will
Through windows in the dark
The children come, the children go
Like arrows with no targets
Like shackles made of snow
True love leaves no traces
If you and I are one
It's lost in our embraces
Like stars against the sun
As a falling leaf may rest
A moment on the air
So your head upon my breast
So my hand upon your hair
And many nights endure
Without a moon or star
So we will endure
When one is gone and far
True love leaves no traces
If you and I are one
It's lost in our embraces
Like stars against the sun
I needed you, and I knew I was in danger
of losing what I used to think was mine
You let me love you till I was a failure,
You let me love you till I was a failure --
Your beauty on my bruise like iodine
I asked you if a man could be forgiven
And though I failed at love, was this a crime?
You said, Don't worry, don't worry, darling
You said, Don't worry, don't you worry, darling
There are many ways a man can serve his time
You covered up that place I could not master
It wasn't dark enough to shut my eyes
So I was with you, O sweet compassion
Yes I was with you, O sweet compassion
Compassion with the sting of iodine
Your saintly kisses reeked of iodine
Your fragrance with a fume of iodine
And pity in the room like iodine
Your sister fingers burned like iodine
And all my wanton lust was iodine
My masquerade of trust was iodine
And everywhere the flare of iodine
The walls of this hotel are paper-thin
Last night I heard you making love to him
The struggle mouth to mouth and limb to limb
The grunt of unity when he came in
I stood there with my ear against the wall
I was not seized by jealousy at all
In fact a burden lifted from my soul
I heard that love was out of my control
A heavy burden lifted from my soul
I heard that love was out of my control
I listened to your kisses at the door
I never heard the world so clear before
You ran your bath and you began to sing
I felt so good I couldn't feel a thing
I stood there with my ear against the wall...
And I can't wait to tell you to your face
And I can't wait for you to take my place
You are The Naked Angel In My Heart
You are The Woman With Her Legs Apart
It's written on the walls of this hotel
You go to heaven once you've been to hell
A heavy burden lifted from my soul
I heard that love was out of my control
Frankie Lane, he was singing Jezebel
I pinned an Iron Cross to my lapel
I walked up to the tallest and the blondest girl
I said, Look, you don't know me now but very soon you will
So won't you let me see
I said ``won't you let me see''
I said ``won't you let me see
Your naked body?''
Just dance me to the dark side of the gym
Chances are I'll let you do most anything
I know you're hungry, I can hear it in your voice
And there are many parts of me to touch, you have your choice
Ah but no you cannot see
She said ``no you cannot see''
She said ``no you cannot see
My naked body''
So We're dancing close, the band is playing Stardust
Balloons and paper streamers floating down on us
She says, You've got a minute left to fall in love
In solemn moments such as this I have put my trust
And all my faith to see
I said all my faith to see
I said all my faith to see
Her naked body
I left a woman waiting
I met her sometime later
She said, I see your eyes are dead
What happened to you, lover?
What happened to you, my lover?
What happened to you, lover?
What happened to you?
And since she spoke the truth to me
I tried to answer truthfully
Whatever happened to my eyes
Happened to your beauty
Happened to your beauty
What happened to your beauty
Happened to me
We took ourselves to someone's bed
And there we fell together
Quick as dogs and truly dead were we
And free as running water
Free as running water
Free as running water
Free as you and me
The way it's got to be
The way it's got to be, lover
I was born in a beauty salon
My father was a dresser of hair
My mother was a girl you could call on
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on
It will only drive you insane
You can't shake it (or break it) with your Motown
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
I've looked behind all of the faces
That smile you down to you knees
And the lips that say, Come on, taste us
And when you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on...
Here come's your bride with her veil on
Approach her, you wretch, if you dare
Approach her, you ape with your tail on
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on...
So I work in that same beauty salon
I'm chained to the old masquerade
The lipstick, the shadow, the silicone
I follow my father's trade
I follow my father's trade
Yes I follow my father's trade
Yes I follow my father's trade
Yes I follow my father's trade
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on
It will only drive you insane
You can't shake it (or break it) with your Motown
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
I touched you once too often
Now I don't know who I am
My fingerprints were missing
When I wiped away the jam
Yes I called my fingerprints all night
But they don't seem to care
The last time that I saw them
They were leafing through your hair
Fingerprints, fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
Yeah I thought I'd leave this morning
So I emptied out your drawer
A hundred thousand fingerprints
They floated to the floor
You know you hardly stopped to pick them up
You don't care what you lose
Ah you don't even seem to know
Whose fingerprints are whose
Fingerprints, fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
And now you want to marry me
You want to take me down the aisle
You want to throw confetti fingerprints
You know that's not my style
O sure I'd like to marry you
But I can't face the dawn
With any girl who knew me
When my fingerprints were on
Fingerprints, fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
Fingerprints, oh fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
Ah the man she wanted all her life was hanging by a thread
``I never even knew how much I wanted you,'' she said.
His muscles they were numbered and his style was obsolete.
``O baby, I have come too late.'' She knelt beside his feet.
``I'll never see a face like yours in years of men to come
I'll never see such arms again in wrestling or in love.''
And all his virtues burning in the smoky Holocaust
She took unto herself most everything her lover lost
Now the master of this landscape he was standing at the view
with a sparrow of St. Francis that he was preaching to
She beckoned to the sentry of his high religious mood
She said, ``I'll make a place between my legs,
I'll show you solitude.''
He offered her an orgy in a many mirrored room
He promised her protection for the issue of her womb
She moved her body hard against a sharpened metal spoon
She stopped the bloody rituals of passage to the moon
She took his much admired oriental frame of mind
and the heart-of-darkness alibi his money hides behind
She took his blonde madonna and his monastery wine --
``This mental space is occupied and everything is mine.''
He tried to make a final stand beside the railway track
She said, ``The art of longing's over and it's never coming back.''
She took his tavern parliament, his cap, his cocky dance,
she mocked his female fashions and his working-class moustache.
The last time that I saw him he was trying hard to get
a woman's education but he's not a woman yet
And the last time that I saw her she was living with some boy
who gives her soul an empty room and gives her body joy.
So the great affair is over but whoever would have guessed
it would leave us all so vacant and so deeply unimpressed
It's like our visit to the moon or to that other star
I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.
It's like our visit to the moon or to that other star
I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.
It's like our visit to the moon or to that other star
I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.
``...wilder and wilder
I sang
and my loins wrinkled
like the forehead of a sage.''
-- Irving Layton
One by one The Guests arrive
The Guests are coming through
The open-hearted many
The broken-hearted few
And no one knows where the night is going
And no one knows why the wine is flowing
O love, I need you, I need you, I need you
I need you, O... I need you now
And those who dance begin to dance
Those who weep begin
And, Welcome, Welcome cries a Voice
Let all my guests come in
And no one knows where the night is going...
And all go stumbling through that house
In lonely secrecy
Saying, Do reveal yourself
Or, Why has thou forsaken me
And no one knows where the night is going...
All at once the torches flare
The inner door flies open
One by one they enter there
In every style of passion
And no one knows where the night is going...
And here they take their sweet repast
While house and grounds dissolve
And one by one The Guests are cast
Beyond the garden wall
And no one knows where the night is going...
And those who dance begin to dance
Those who weep begin
Those who earnestly are lost
Are lost and lost again
And no one knows where the night is going...
One by The Guests arrive
The Guests are coming through
The broken-hearted many
The open-hearted few
And no one knows where the night is going...
Do you remember the pledges
That we pledged in the passionate night
They're soiled now and torn at the edges
Like moths on a still yellow light
No penance serves to renew them
Nor massive transfusions of trust
Not even revenge can undo them
So twisted these vows and so crushed
And you say you've been humbled in love
Cut down in your love
Forced to kneel in the mud
Next to me
Ah but why so bitterly
Turn from the one
Who kneels there
As deeply as thee
Children have taken these pledges
They have ferried them out of the past
Oh beyond all the graves and the hedges
Where love must go hiding at last
And here where there is no description
Here in the moment at hand
No sinner need rise up forgiven
No victim need limp to the stand
And you say you've been humbled in love...
And look, dear heart, at the virgin
Look how she welcomes him into her gown
Yes, and mark how the stranger's cold armour
Dissolves like a star falling down
Why trade this vision for desire
When you may have them both
You will never see a man this naked
I will never hold a woman this close
And you say you've been humbled in love...
Why do you stand by the window
Abandoned to beauty and pride
The thorn of the night in your bosom
The spear of the age in your side
Lost in the rages of fragrance
Lost in the rags of remorse
Lost in the waves of a sickness
That loosens the high silver nerves
Oh chosen love, Oh frozen love
Oh tangle of matter and ghost
Oh darling of angels, demons and saints
And the whole broken-hearted host
Gentle this soul
And come forth from the cloud of anoint
And kiss the cheek of the moon
The New Jerusalem glowing
Why tarry all night in the ruin
And leave no word of discomfort
And leave no observer to mourn
But climb on your tears and be silent
Like a rose on its ladder of thorns
Oh chosen love, Oh frozen love...
Then lay your rose on the fire
The fire give up to the sun
The sun give over to splendour
In the arms of the high holy one
For the holy one dreams of a letter
Dreams of a letter's death
Oh bless thee continuous stutter
Of the word being made into flesh
Oh chosen love, Oh frozen love...
Gentle this soul
(co-written and arranged by John Lissauer)
I came so far for beauty
I left so much behind
My patience and my family
My masterpiece unsigned
I thought I'd be rewarded
For such a lonely choice
And surely she would answer
To such a very hopeless voice
I practiced all my sainthood
I gave to one and all
But the rumours of my virtue
They moved her not at all
I changed my style to silver
I changed my clothed to black
And where I would surrender
Now I would attack
I stormed the old casino
For the money and the flesh
And I myself decided
What was rotten and what was fresh
And men to do my bidding
And broken bones to teach
The value of my pardon
The shadow of my reach
But no, I could not touch her
With such a heavy hand
Her star beyond my order
Her nakedness unmanned
I came so far for beauty
I left so much behind
My patience and my family
My masterpiece unsigned
(by M. Antoine Gerin-Lajoie in 1842)
Un Canadien Errant
Banni de ses foyers,
Parcourait en pleurant
Des pays étrangers.
Un jour, triste et pensif
Assis au bord des flots,
Au courant fugitif
Il adressa ces mots
Si tu vois mon pays
Mon pays malheureux
Va dire à mes amis
Que je me souviens d'eux
O jours si pleins d'appas
Vous êtes disparus
Et ma pays, hélas
Je ne la verrai plus
The lost Canadian
A wandering Canadian,
banned from his hearths,
travelled while crying
in foreign lands.
travelled while crying
in foreign lands.
One day, sad and pensive,
sitting by the flowing waters,
to the fleeing current
he addressed these words:
to the fleeing current
he addressed these words:
``If you see my country,
my unhappy country,
go tell my friends
that I remember them.
go tell my friends
that I remember them.
O days so full of charms,
you have vanished...
And my native land, alas!
I will see it no more.
And my native land, alas!
I will see it no more.
Once a Canadian lad
Exiled from hearth and home
Wandered alone and sad
Through alien lands unknown
Down by a rushing stream
Thoughful and sad one day
He watched the water pass
And to it he did say
If you should reach my land
My most unhappy land
Please speak to all my friends
So they will understand
Tell them how much I wish
That I could be once more
In my beloved land
That I will see no more
Now the Swan it floated on the English river
The Rose of High Romance it opened wide
A suntanned woman yawned me through the summer
The Judges watched us from the other side
I told my mother, Mother I must leave you
Preserve my room, but do not shed a tear
Should rumour of a shabby ending reach you
It was half my fault and half the atmosphere
But the Rose I sickened with a scarlet fever
The Swan I tempted with a sense of shame
She said at last I was her finest lover
And if she withered, I would be to blame
The Judges said, You missed it by a fraction
Rise up and brace your troops for the attack
The Dreamers ride against the Men of Action
Oh see the Men of Action falling back
But I lingered on her thighs a fatal moment
I kissed her lips as though I thirsted still
My falsity had stung me like a hornet
The poison sank and it paralysed my will
I could not move to warn all the younger soldiers
That they had been deserted from above
So on battlefields from here to Barcelona
I'm listed with the enemies of love
And long ago she said, I must be leaving
But keep my body here to lie upon
You can move it up and down and when I'm sleeping
Run some wire through that Rose and wind the Swan
So daily I renew my idle duty
I touch her here and there, I know my place
I kiss her open mouth and I praise her beauty
And people call me Traitor to my face
All summer long she touched me
She gathered in my soul
>From many a thorn, from many thickets
Her fingers like a weaver's, quick and cool
And the light came from her body
And the night went through her grace
All summer long she touched me
And I knew her, I knew her face to face
And her dress was blue and silver
And her words were few and small
She is the vessel of the whole wide world
Mistress, oh mistress of us all
Dearly dead, Queen of Solitude
I thank you with my heart
For keeping me so close to Thee
While so many, oh so many stood apart
And the light came from her body
And the night went through her grace
All summer long she touched me
I knew her, I knew her face to face
Where where where
Is my Gypsy wife tonight
I've heard all the wild reports
They can't be right
But whose head is this she's dancing with
On the threshing-floor
Whose darkness deepens in her arms
A little more
And where where is my Gypsy wife tonight
The silver knives are flashing
In the tired old cafe
A ghost climbs on the table
In a bridal negligee
She says, My body is the light
My body is the way
I raise my arm against it all
And I catch the bride's bouquet
And where where is my Gypsy wife tonight
Too early for the Rainbow
Too early for the Dove
These are the Final Days, this is
The Darkness, this is the Flood
And there is no man or woman
Who can't be touched
But you who come between them
Will be judged
And where where is my Gypsy wife tonight
I've never seen your eyes so wide
I've never seen your appetite quite this occupied
Elsewhere is your feast of love I know
Long ago we agreed to keep it light
So lets be married one more night
It's light enough
To let it go
Remember when the scenery started fading
I held you 'til you learned to walk on air
So don't look down, the ground is gone,
There's no one waiting anyway
The Smoky Life is practiced everywhere
So set your restless heart at ease
Take a lesson from these autumn leaves
They waste no time waiting for the snow
Don't argue now or you'll be late
There is nothing to investigate
It's light enough
To let it go
Come on back if the moment lends
You can look up all my very closest friends
Light enough to let it go
Say a prayer for the cowboy
His mare's run away
And he'll walk til he finds her
His darling, his stray
But the river's in flood
And the roads are awash
And the bridges break up
In the panic of loss.
And there's nothing to follow
There's nowhere to go
She's gone like the summer
Gone like the snow
And the crickets are breaking
His heart with their song
As the day caves in
And the night is all wrong
Did he dream, was it she
Who went galloping past
And bent down the fern
Broke open the grass
And printed the mud with
The iron and the gold
That he nailed to her feet
When he was the lord
And although she goes grazing
A minute away
He tracks her all night
He tracks her all day
Oh blind to her presence
Except to compare
His injury here
With her punishment there
Then at home on a branch
In the highest tree
A songbird sings out
So suddenly
Ah the sun is warm
And the soft winds ride
On the willow trees
By the river side
Oh the world is sweet
The world is wide
And she's there where
The light and the darkness divide
And the steam's coming off her
She's huge and she's shy
And she steps on the moon
When she paws at the sky
And she comes to his hand
But she's not really tame
She longs to be lost
He longs for the same
And she'll bolt and she'll plunge
Through the first open pass
To roll and to feed
In the sweet mountain grass
Or she'll make a break
For the high plateau
Where there's nothing above
And there's nothing below
And it's time for the burden
It's time for the whip
Will she walk through the flame
Can he shoot from the hip
So he binds himself
To the galloping mare
And she binds herself
To the rider there
And there is no space
But there's left and right
And there is no time
But there's day and night
And he leans on her neck
And he whispers low
``Whither thou goest
I will go''
And they turn as one
And they head for the plain
No need for the whip
Ah, no need for the rein
Now the clasp of this union
Who fastens it tight?
Who snaps it asunder
The very next night
Some say the rider
Some say the mare
Or that love's like the smoke
Beyond all repair
But my darling says
``Leonard, just let it go by
That old silhouette
On the great western sky''
So I pick out a tune
And they move right along
And they're gone like the smoke
And they're gone like this song
Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Oh, let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone
Let me feel you moving like they do in Babylon
Show me slowly what I only know the limits of
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the wedding now, dance me on and on
Dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
We're both of us beneath our love, we're both of us above
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the children who are asking to be born
Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn
Raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I'm gathered safely in
Touch me with your naked hand or touch me with your glove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Maybe I'm still hurting
I can't turn the other cheek
But you know that I still love you
It's just that I can't speak
I looked for you in everyone
And they called me on that too
I lived alone but I was only
Coming back to you
Ah they're shutting down the factory now
Just when all the bills are due
And the fields they're under lock and key
Tho' the rain and the sun come through
And springtime starts but then it stops
In the name of something new
And all the senses rise against this
Coming back to you
And they're handing down my sentence now
And I know what I must do
Another mile of silence while I'm
Coming back to you
There are many in your life
And many still to be
Since you are a shining light
There's many that you'll see
But I have to deal with envy
When you choose the precious few
Who've left their pride on the other side of
Coming back to you
Even in your arms I know
I'll never get it right
Even when you bend to give me
Comfort in the night
I've got to have your word on this
Or none of it is true
And all I've said was just instead of
Coming back to you
How many times did you call me
And I knew it was late
I left everybody
But I never went straight
I don't claim to be guilty
But I do understand
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
Now my heart's like a blister
>From doing what I do
If the moon has a sister
It's got to be you
I'm going to miss you forever
Tho' it's not what I planned
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
Now the deal has been dirty
me. I felt a cardboard placard on his back. And when we passed a
streetlight, I could read it, it said ``Please don't pass me by -- I am
blind, but you can see -- I've been blinded totally -- Please don't pass me
by.'' I was walking along 7th Avenue, when I came to 14th Street I saw on
the corner curious mutilations of the human form; it was a school for
handicapped people. And there were cripples, and people in wheelchairs and
crutches and it was snowing, and I got this sense that the whole city was
singing this:
Oh please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh please don't pass me by.
And you know as I was walking I thought it was them who were singing it, I
thought it was they who were singing it, I thought it was the other who was
singing it, I thought it was someone else. But as I moved along I knew it
was me, and that I was singing it to myself. It went:
Please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
well, I've been blinded totally,
oh please don't pass me by.
Oh please don't pass me by.
Now I know that you're sitting there deep in your velvet seats and you're
thinking ``Uh, he's up there saying something that he thinks about, but I'll
never have to sing that song.'' But I promise you friends, that you're going
to be singing this song: it may not be tonight, it may not be tomorrow, but
one day you'll be on your knees and I want you to know the words when the
time comes. Because you're going to have to sing it to yourself, or to
another, or to your brother. You're going to have to learn to sing this
song, it goes:
Please don't pass me by,
ah, you don't have to sing this... not for you.
Please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh please don't pass me by.
Well I sing this for the Jews and the Gypsies and the smoke that they made.
And I sing this for the children of England, their faces so grave. And I
sing this for a saviour with no one to save. Hey, won't you be naked for
me? Hey, won't you be naked for me? It goes:
Please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh now, please don't pass me by.
Now there's nothing that I tell you that will help you connect the blood
tortured night with the day that comes next. But I want it to hurt you, I
want it to end. Oh, won't you be naked for me? Oh now:
Please don't pass me by,
oh please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, but you can see,
but I've been blinded totally,
oh, please don't pass me by.
Well I sing this song for you Blonde Beasts, I sing this song for you
Venuses upon your shells on the foam of the sea. And I sing this for the
freaks and the cripples, and the hunchback, and the burned, and the
burning, and the maimed, and the broken, and the torn, and all of those
that you talk about at the coffee tables, at the meetings, and the
demonstrations, on the streets, in your music, in my songs. I mean the real
ones that are burning, I mean the real ones that are burning
I say, please don't pass me by,
oh now, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yeah but you can see,
ah now, I've been blinded totally,
oh no, please don't pass me by.
I know that you still think that its me. I know that you think that there's
somebody else. I know that these words aren't yours. But I tell you friends
that one day
You're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down on your knees,
you're going to get down...
Oh, please don't pass me by,
oh, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yeah but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh, please don't pass me by.
Well you know I have my songs and I have my poems. I have my book and I
have the army, and sometimes I have your applause. I make some money, but
you know what my friends, I'm still out there on the corner. I'm with the
freaks, I'm with the hunted, I'm with the maimed, yes, I'm with the torn,
I'm with the down, I'm with the poor. Come on now...
Ah, please don't pass me by,
well I've got to go now friends,
but, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yeah but you can see,
oh, I've been blinded, I've been blinded totally,
oh now, please don't pass me by.
Now I want to take away my dignity, yes take my dignity, my friends, take
my dignity, take my form, take my style, take my honour, take my courage,
take my time, take my time, take my time... 'Cause you know I'm with you
singing this song. And I wish you would, I wish you would, I wish you would
go home with someone else. Wish you'd go home with someone else. I wish
you'd go home with someone else. Don't be the person that you came with.
Oh, don't be the person that you came with, Oh don't be the person that you
came with. Ah, I'm not going to be. I can't stand him. I can't stand who I
am. That's why I've got to get down on my knees. Because I can't make it by
myself. I'm not by myself anymore because the man I was before he was a
tyrant, he was a slave, he was in chains, he was broken and then he sang:
Oh, please don't pass me by,
oh, please don't pass me by,
for I am blind, yes I am blind, Oh but you can see,
yes, I've been blinded totally,
oh, please don't pass me by.
Well I hope I see you out there on the corner. Yeah I hope as I go by that
I hear you whisper with the breeze. Because I'm going to leave you now, I'm
going to find me someone new. Find someone knew.
And please don't pass me by.
Sometimes I find I get to thinking of the past.
We swore to each other that our love would surely last.
You kept right on loving, I went on a fast,
now I am too thin and your love is too vast.
But I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
Well, I choose the rooms that I live in with care,
the windows are small and the walls almost bare,
there's only got one bed and there's only got one prayer;
I listen all night for your step on the stair.
But I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight, tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
Oh, sometimes I see her undressing for me,
she's the soft naked lady that love meant her to be
and she's moving her body so brave and so free.
If I've got to remember that's a fine memory.
And I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight, tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
Ah, I looked into the mirrors in numberous places
They all smile back at me with their troublous (?) faces
And the car that they delt me...(?)
And the horses to me at the races.
But I know from your eyes
and I know from her your (?) little smile
that tonight, tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
There's still one or two of us walking the street
No arrows or directions...(?) under their feet
No angels...(?) away from the...(?)
And no...(?)
But I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
And I know from your eyes
and I know from your (?) little smile
that tonight will be fine,
will be fine, will be fine, will be fine
for a while.
(A Cohen poem set to music)
Queen Victoria,
My father and all his tobacco loved you,
I love you too in all your forms,
the slim and lovely virgin floating among German beer,
the mean governess of the huge pink maps,
the solitary mourner of a prince.
Queen Victoria,
I am cold and rainy,
I am dirty as a glass roof in a train station,
I feel like an empty cast iron exhibition,
I want ornaments on everything,
because my love, she gone with other boys.
Queen Victoria,
do you have a punishment under the white lace,
will you be short with her, will you make her read those little Bibles,
will you spank her with a mechanical corset.
I want her pure as power, I want her skin slightly musty with petticoats
will you wash the easy bidet out of her head?
Queen Victoria,
I'm not much nourished by modern love,
will you come into my life
with your sorrow and your black carriages,
And your perfect
memories.
Queen Victoria,
the Twentieth Century belongs to you and me.
Let us be two severe giants not less lonely for our partnership,
who discolour test tubes in the halls of Science,
who turn up unwelcome at every World's Fair,
heavy with proverbs and corrections,
confusing the star-dazed tourists
with our incomparable sense of loss.
You were the promise at dawn,
I was the morning after.
You were Jesus Christ my Lord,
I was the money lender.
You were the sensitive woman,
I was the very reverend Freud.
You were the manual orgasm,
I was the dirty little boy.
And is this what you wanted
to live in a house that is haunted
by the ghost of you and me?
Is this what you wanted...
You were Marlon Brando,
I was Steve McQueen.
You were K.Y. Jelly,
I was Vaseline.
You were the father of modern medicine,
I was Mr. Clean.
You where the whore and the beast of Babylon,
I was Rin Tin Tin.
And is this what you wanted...
And is this what you wanted...
You got old and wrinkled,
I stayed seventeen.
You lusted after so many,
I lay here with one.
You defied your solitude,
I came through alone.
You said you could never love me,
I undid your gown.
And is this what you wanted...
And is this what you wanted...
I mean is this what you wanted...
That's right, is this what you wanted...
I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel,
you were talking so brave and so sweet,
giving me head on the unmade bed,
while the limousines wait in the street.
Those were the reasons and that was New York,
we were running for the money and the flesh.
And that was called love for the workers in song
probably still is for those of them left.
Ah but you got away, didn't you babe,
you just turned your back on the crowd,
you got away, I never once heard you say,
I need you, I don't need you,
I need you, I don't need you
and all of that jiving around.
I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel,
you were famous, your heart was a legend.
You told me again you preferred handsome men
but for me you would make an exception.
And clenching your fist for the ones like us
who are oppressed by the figures of beauty,
you fixed yourself, you said, ``Well never mind,
we are ugly but we have the music.''
And then you got away, didn't you babe...
I don't mean to suggest that I loved you the best,
I can't keep track of each fallen robin.
I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel,
that's all, I don't even think of you that often.
I asked my father,
I said, ``Father change my name.''
The one I'm using now it's covered up
with fear and filth and cowardice and shame.
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
He said, ``I locked you in this body,
I meant it as a kind of trial.
You can use it for a weapon,
or to make some woman smile.''
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
``Then let me start again,'' I cried,
``please let me start again,
I want a face that's fair this time,
I want a spirit that is calm.''
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
``I never turned aside,'' he said,
``I never walked away.
It was you who built the temple,
it was you who covered up my face.''
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
And may the spirit of this song,
may it rise up pure and free.
May it be a shield for you,
a shield against the enemy.
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
Yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me,
yes and lover, lover, lover, lover,
lover, lover, lover come back to me.
Field Commander Cohen,
he was our most important spy.
Wounded in the line of duty,
parachuting acid into
diplomatic cocktail parties,
urging Fidel Castro to
abandon fields and castles.
Leave it all and like a man,
come back to nothing special,
such as waiting rooms
and ticket lines,
silver bullet suicides,
and messianic ocean tides,
and racial roller-coaster rides
and other forms of boredom advertised as poetry.
I know you need your sleep now,
I know your life's been hard.
But many men are falling,
where you promised to stand guard.
I never asked but I heard
you cast your lot along with the poor.
But then I overheard your prayer,
that you be this and nothing more
than just some grateful faithful woman's
favourite singing millionaire,
the patron Saint of envy and the grocer of despair,
working for the Yankee Dollar.
I know you need your sleep now...
Ah, lover come and lie with me,
if my lover is who you are,
and be your sweetest self awhile
until I ask for more, my child.
Then let the other selves be wrong,
yeah, let them manifest and come
till every taste is on the tongue,
till love is pierced and love is hung,
and every kind of freedom done, then oh,
oh my love, oh my love, oh my love,
oh my love, oh my love, oh my love.
Why don't you try to do without him?
Why don't you try to live alone?
Do you really need his hands for your passion?
Do you really need his heart for your throne?
Do you need his label for your baby?
Do you need his beast for the bone?
Do you need to hold a leash to be a lady?
I know you're going to make, make it on your own.
Why don't your try to forget him?
Just open up your dainty little hand.
You know this life is filled with many sweet companions,
many satisfying one-night stands.
Do you want to be the ditch around a tower?
Do you want to be the moonlight in his cave?
Do you want to give your blessing to his power
as he goes whistling past his daddy,
past his daddy's grave.
I'd like to take you take you to the ceremony,
well, that is if I remember the way.
You see Jack and Jill they're going to join their misery,
I'm afraid it's time for everyone to pray.
You can see they've finally taken cover,
they're willing, yeah they're willing to obey.
Their vows are difficult, they're for each other,
so let nobody put a loophole, a loophole in their way.
There is a war between the rich and poor,
a war between the man and the woman.
There is a war between the ones who say there is a war
and the ones who say there isn't.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
that's right, get in it,
why don't you come on back to the war,
it's just beginning.
Well I live here with a woman and a child,
the situation makes me kind of nervous.
Yes, I rise up from her arms,
she says ``I guess you call this love'';
I call it service.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
don't be a tourist,
why don't you come on back to the war,
before it hurts us,
why don't you come on back to the war,
let's all get nervous.
You cannot stand what I've become,
you much prefer the gentleman I was before.
I was so easy to defeat, I was so easy to control,
I didn't even know there was a war.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
don't be embarrassed,
why don't you come on back to the war,
you can still get married.
There is a war between the rich and poor,
a war between the man and the woman.
There is a war between the left and right,
a war between the black and white,
a war between the odd and the even.
Why don't you come on back to the war,
pick up your tiny burden,
why don't you come on back to the war,
let's all get even,
why don't you come on back to the war,
can't you hear me speaking?
Now the courtroom is quiet, but who will confess.
Is it true you betrayed us? The answer is Yes.
Then read me the list of the crimes that are mine,
I will ask for the mercy that you love to decline.
And all the ladies go moist, and the judge has no choice,
a singer must die for the lie in his voice.
And I thank you, I thank you for doing your duty,
you keepers of truth, you guardians of beauty.
Your vision is right, my vision is wrong,
I'm sorry for smudging the air with my song.
Lalala...
Oh, the night it is thick, my defences are hid
in the clothes of a woman I would like to forgive,
in the rings of her silk, in the hinge of her thighs,
where I have to go begging in beauty's disguise.
Oh goodnight, goodnight, my night after night,
my night after night, after night,
after night, after night, after night.
I am so afraid that I listen to you,
your sun glassed protectors they do that to you.
It's their ways to detain, their ways to disgrace,
their knee in your balls and their fist in your face.
Yes and long live the state by whoever it's made,
sir, I didn't see nothing, I was just getting home late.
Lalala...
I tried to leave you, I don't deny
I closed the book on us, at least a hundred times.
I'd wake up every morning by your side.
The years go by, you lose your pride.
The baby's crying, so you do not go outside,
and all your work it's right before your eyes.
Goodnight, my darling, I hope you're satisfied,
the bed is kind of narrow, but my arms are open wide.
And here's a man still working for your smile.
And who by fire, who by water,
who in the sunshine, who in the night time,
who by high ordeal, who by common trial,
who in your merry merry month of may,
who by very slow decay,
and who shall I say is calling?
And who in her lonely slip, who by barbiturate,
who in these realms of love, who by something blunt,
and who by avalanche, who by powder,
who for his greed, who for his hunger,
and who shall I say is calling?
And who by brave assent, who by accident,
who in solitude, who in this mirror,
who by his lady's command, who by his own hand,
who in mortal chains, who in power,
and who shall I say is calling?
Many men have loved the bells
you fastened to the rein,
and everyone who wanted you
they found what they will always want again.
Your beauty lost to you yourself
just as it was lost to them.
Oh take this longing from my tongue,
whatever useless things these hands have done.
Let me see your beauty broken down,
like you would do for one you love.
Your body like a searchlight
my poverty revealed,
I would like to try your charity
until you cry, ``Now you must try my greed.''
And everything depends upon
how near you sleep to me,
Just take this longing from my tongue,
all the lonely things my hands have done.
Let me see your beauty broken down,
like you would do for one your love.
Hungry as an archway
through which the troops have passed,
I stand in ruins behind you,
with your winter clothes, your broken sandal straps.
I love to see you naked over there
especially from the back.
Oh take this longing from my tongue,
all the useless things my hands have done,
untie for me your hired blue gown,
like you would do for one that you love.
You're faithful to the better man,
I'm afraid that he left.
So let me judge your love affair
in this very room where I have sentenced mine to death.
I'll even wear these old laurel leaves
that he's shaken from his head.
Just take this longing from my tongue,
all the useless things my hands have done,
let me see your beauty broken down,
like you would do for one you love.
Like you would do for one you love.
Alas, my love, you did me wrong,
to cast me out discourteously,
for I have loved you so long,
delighting in your very company.
Now if you intend to show me disdain,
don't you know it all the more enraptures me,
for even so I still remain your lover in captivity.
Green sleeves, you're all alone,
the leaves have fallen, the men have gone.
Green sleeves, there's no one home,
not even the Lady Green Sleeves.
I sang my songs, I told my lies,
to lie between your matchless thighs.
And ain't it fine, ain't it wild
to finally end our exercise.
Then I saw you naked in the early dawn,
oh, I hoped you would be someone new.
I reached for you but you were gone,
so lady I'm going too.
Green sleeves, you're all alone,
the leaves have fallen, the men have gone.
Green sleeves, there's no one home,
not even the Lady Green Sleeves.
Green sleeves, you're all alone,
the leaves have fallen, the men have all gone home.
Green sleeves, it's so easily done,
leaving the Lady Green Sleeves.
All songs by Phil Spector and Leonard Cohen.
As the mist leaves no scar
On the dark green hill
So my body leaves no scar
On you and never will
Through windows in the dark
The children come, the children go
Like arrows with no targets
Like shackles made of snow
True love leaves no traces
If you and I are one
It's lost in our embraces
Like stars against the sun
As a falling leaf may rest
A moment on the air
So your head upon my breast
So my hand upon your hair
And many nights endure
Without a moon or star
So we will endure
When one is gone and far
True love leaves no traces
If you and I are one
It's lost in our embraces
Like stars against the sun
I needed you, and I knew I was in danger
of losing what I used to think was mine
You let me love you till I was a failure,
You let me love you till I was a failure --
Your beauty on my bruise like iodine
I asked you if a man could be forgiven
And though I failed at love, was this a crime?
You said, Don't worry, don't worry, darling
You said, Don't worry, don't you worry, darling
There are many ways a man can serve his time
You covered up that place I could not master
It wasn't dark enough to shut my eyes
So I was with you, O sweet compassion
Yes I was with you, O sweet compassion
Compassion with the sting of iodine
Your saintly kisses reeked of iodine
Your fragrance with a fume of iodine
And pity in the room like iodine
Your sister fingers burned like iodine
And all my wanton lust was iodine
My masquerade of trust was iodine
And everywhere the flare of iodine
The walls of this hotel are paper-thin
Last night I heard you making love to him
The struggle mouth to mouth and limb to limb
The grunt of unity when he came in
I stood there with my ear against the wall
I was not seized by jealousy at all
In fact a burden lifted from my soul
I heard that love was out of my control
A heavy burden lifted from my soul
I heard that love was out of my control
I listened to your kisses at the door
I never heard the world so clear before
You ran your bath and you began to sing
I felt so good I couldn't feel a thing
I stood there with my ear against the wall...
And I can't wait to tell you to your face
And I can't wait for you to take my place
You are The Naked Angel In My Heart
You are The Woman With Her Legs Apart
It's written on the walls of this hotel
You go to heaven once you've been to hell
A heavy burden lifted from my soul
I heard that love was out of my control
Frankie Lane, he was singing Jezebel
I pinned an Iron Cross to my lapel
I walked up to the tallest and the blondest girl
I said, Look, you don't know me now but very soon you will
So won't you let me see
I said ``won't you let me see''
I said ``won't you let me see
Your naked body?''
Just dance me to the dark side of the gym
Chances are I'll let you do most anything
I know you're hungry, I can hear it in your voice
And there are many parts of me to touch, you have your choice
Ah but no you cannot see
She said ``no you cannot see''
She said ``no you cannot see
My naked body''
So We're dancing close, the band is playing Stardust
Balloons and paper streamers floating down on us
She says, You've got a minute left to fall in love
In solemn moments such as this I have put my trust
And all my faith to see
I said all my faith to see
I said all my faith to see
Her naked body
I left a woman waiting
I met her sometime later
She said, I see your eyes are dead
What happened to you, lover?
What happened to you, my lover?
What happened to you, lover?
What happened to you?
And since she spoke the truth to me
I tried to answer truthfully
Whatever happened to my eyes
Happened to your beauty
Happened to your beauty
What happened to your beauty
Happened to me
We took ourselves to someone's bed
And there we fell together
Quick as dogs and truly dead were we
And free as running water
Free as running water
Free as running water
Free as you and me
The way it's got to be
The way it's got to be, lover
I was born in a beauty salon
My father was a dresser of hair
My mother was a girl you could call on
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
When you called she was always there
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on
It will only drive you insane
You can't shake it (or break it) with your Motown
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
I've looked behind all of the faces
That smile you down to you knees
And the lips that say, Come on, taste us
And when you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
When you try to they make you say Please
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on...
Here come's your bride with her veil on
Approach her, you wretch, if you dare
Approach her, you ape with your tail on
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Once you have her she'll always be there
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on...
So I work in that same beauty salon
I'm chained to the old masquerade
The lipstick, the shadow, the silicone
I follow my father's trade
I follow my father's trade
Yes I follow my father's trade
Yes I follow my father's trade
Yes I follow my father's trade
Ah but don't go home with your hard-on
It will only drive you insane
You can't shake it (or break it) with your Motown
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
You can't melt it down in the rain
I touched you once too often
Now I don't know who I am
My fingerprints were missing
When I wiped away the jam
Yes I called my fingerprints all night
But they don't seem to care
The last time that I saw them
They were leafing through your hair
Fingerprints, fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
Yeah I thought I'd leave this morning
So I emptied out your drawer
A hundred thousand fingerprints
They floated to the floor
You know you hardly stopped to pick them up
You don't care what you lose
Ah you don't even seem to know
Whose fingerprints are whose
Fingerprints, fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
And now you want to marry me
You want to take me down the aisle
You want to throw confetti fingerprints
You know that's not my style
O sure I'd like to marry you
But I can't face the dawn
With any girl who knew me
When my fingerprints were on
Fingerprints, fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
Fingerprints, oh fingerprints
Where are you now my fingerprints?
Ah the man she wanted all her life was hanging by a thread
``I never even knew how much I wanted you,'' she said.
His muscles they were numbered and his style was obsolete.
``O baby, I have come too late.'' She knelt beside his feet.
``I'll never see a face like yours in years of men to come
I'll never see such arms again in wrestling or in love.''
And all his virtues burning in the smoky Holocaust
She took unto herself most everything her lover lost
Now the master of this landscape he was standing at the view
with a sparrow of St. Francis that he was preaching to
She beckoned to the sentry of his high religious mood
She said, ``I'll make a place between my legs,
I'll show you solitude.''
He offered her an orgy in a many mirrored room
He promised her protection for the issue of her womb
She moved her body hard against a sharpened metal spoon
She stopped the bloody rituals of passage to the moon
She took his much admired oriental frame of mind
and the heart-of-darkness alibi his money hides behind
She took his blonde madonna and his monastery wine --
``This mental space is occupied and everything is mine.''
He tried to make a final stand beside the railway track
She said, ``The art of longing's over and it's never coming back.''
She took his tavern parliament, his cap, his cocky dance,
she mocked his female fashions and his working-class moustache.
The last time that I saw him he was trying hard to get
a woman's education but he's not a woman yet
And the last time that I saw her she was living with some boy
who gives her soul an empty room and gives her body joy.
So the great affair is over but whoever would have guessed
it would leave us all so vacant and so deeply unimpressed
It's like our visit to the moon or to that other star
I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.
It's like our visit to the moon or to that other star
I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.
It's like our visit to the moon or to that other star
I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.
``...wilder and wilder
I sang
and my loins wrinkled
like the forehead of a sage.''
-- Irving Layton
One by one The Guests arrive
The Guests are coming through
The open-hearted many
The broken-hearted few
And no one knows where the night is going
And no one knows why the wine is flowing
O love, I need you, I need you, I need you
I need you, O... I need you now
And those who dance begin to dance
Those who weep begin
And, Welcome, Welcome cries a Voice
Let all my guests come in
And no one knows where the night is going...
And all go stumbling through that house
In lonely secrecy
Saying, Do reveal yourself
Or, Why has thou forsaken me
And no one knows where the night is going...
All at once the torches flare
The inner door flies open
One by one they enter there
In every style of passion
And no one knows where the night is going...
And here they take their sweet repast
While house and grounds dissolve
And one by one The Guests are cast
Beyond the garden wall
And no one knows where the night is going...
And those who dance begin to dance
Those who weep begin
Those who earnestly are lost
Are lost and lost again
And no one knows where the night is going...
One by The Guests arrive
The Guests are coming through
The broken-hearted many
The open-hearted few
And no one knows where the night is going...
Do you remember the pledges
That we pledged in the passionate night
They're soiled now and torn at the edges
Like moths on a still yellow light
No penance serves to renew them
Nor massive transfusions of trust
Not even revenge can undo them
So twisted these vows and so crushed
And you say you've been humbled in love
Cut down in your love
Forced to kneel in the mud
Next to me
Ah but why so bitterly
Turn from the one
Who kneels there
As deeply as thee
Children have taken these pledges
They have ferried them out of the past
Oh beyond all the graves and the hedges
Where love must go hiding at last
And here where there is no description
Here in the moment at hand
No sinner need rise up forgiven
No victim need limp to the stand
And you say you've been humbled in love...
And look, dear heart, at the virgin
Look how she welcomes him into her gown
Yes, and mark how the stranger's cold armour
Dissolves like a star falling down
Why trade this vision for desire
When you may have them both
You will never see a man this naked
I will never hold a woman this close
And you say you've been humbled in love...
Why do you stand by the window
Abandoned to beauty and pride
The thorn of the night in your bosom
The spear of the age in your side
Lost in the rages of fragrance
Lost in the rags of remorse
Lost in the waves of a sickness
That loosens the high silver nerves
Oh chosen love, Oh frozen love
Oh tangle of matter and ghost
Oh darling of angels, demons and saints
And the whole broken-hearted host
Gentle this soul
And come forth from the cloud of anoint
And kiss the cheek of the moon
The New Jerusalem glowing
Why tarry all night in the ruin
And leave no word of discomfort
And leave no observer to mourn
But climb on your tears and be silent
Like a rose on its ladder of thorns
Oh chosen love, Oh frozen love...
Then lay your rose on the fire
The fire give up to the sun
The sun give over to splendour
In the arms of the high holy one
For the holy one dreams of a letter
Dreams of a letter's death
Oh bless thee continuous stutter
Of the word being made into flesh
Oh chosen love, Oh frozen love...
Gentle this soul
(co-written and arranged by John Lissauer)
I came so far for beauty
I left so much behind
My patience and my family
My masterpiece unsigned
I thought I'd be rewarded
For such a lonely choice
And surely she would answer
To such a very hopeless voice
I practiced all my sainthood
I gave to one and all
But the rumours of my virtue
They moved her not at all
I changed my style to silver
I changed my clothed to black
And where I would surrender
Now I would attack
I stormed the old casino
For the money and the flesh
And I myself decided
What was rotten and what was fresh
And men to do my bidding
And broken bones to teach
The value of my pardon
The shadow of my reach
But no, I could not touch her
With such a heavy hand
Her star beyond my order
Her nakedness unmanned
I came so far for beauty
I left so much behind
My patience and my family
My masterpiece unsigned
(by M. Antoine Gerin-Lajoie in 1842)
Un Canadien Errant
Banni de ses foyers,
Parcourait en pleurant
Des pays étrangers.
Un jour, triste et pensif
Assis au bord des flots,
Au courant fugitif
Il adressa ces mots
Si tu vois mon pays
Mon pays malheureux
Va dire à mes amis
Que je me souviens d'eux
O jours si pleins d'appas
Vous êtes disparus
Et ma pays, hélas
Je ne la verrai plus
The lost Canadian
A wandering Canadian,
banned from his hearths,
travelled while crying
in foreign lands.
travelled while crying
in foreign lands.
One day, sad and pensive,
sitting by the flowing waters,
to the fleeing current
he addressed these words:
to the fleeing current
he addressed these words:
``If you see my country,
my unhappy country,
go tell my friends
that I remember them.
go tell my friends
that I remember them.
O days so full of charms,
you have vanished...
And my native land, alas!
I will see it no more.
And my native land, alas!
I will see it no more.
Once a Canadian lad
Exiled from hearth and home
Wandered alone and sad
Through alien lands unknown
Down by a rushing stream
Thoughful and sad one day
He watched the water pass
And to it he did say
If you should reach my land
My most unhappy land
Please speak to all my friends
So they will understand
Tell them how much I wish
That I could be once more
In my beloved land
That I will see no more
Now the Swan it floated on the English river
The Rose of High Romance it opened wide
A suntanned woman yawned me through the summer
The Judges watched us from the other side
I told my mother, Mother I must leave you
Preserve my room, but do not shed a tear
Should rumour of a shabby ending reach you
It was half my fault and half the atmosphere
But the Rose I sickened with a scarlet fever
The Swan I tempted with a sense of shame
She said at last I was her finest lover
And if she withered, I would be to blame
The Judges said, You missed it by a fraction
Rise up and brace your troops for the attack
The Dreamers ride against the Men of Action
Oh see the Men of Action falling back
But I lingered on her thighs a fatal moment
I kissed her lips as though I thirsted still
My falsity had stung me like a hornet
The poison sank and it paralysed my will
I could not move to warn all the younger soldiers
That they had been deserted from above
So on battlefields from here to Barcelona
I'm listed with the enemies of love
And long ago she said, I must be leaving
But keep my body here to lie upon
You can move it up and down and when I'm sleeping
Run some wire through that Rose and wind the Swan
So daily I renew my idle duty
I touch her here and there, I know my place
I kiss her open mouth and I praise her beauty
And people call me Traitor to my face
All summer long she touched me
She gathered in my soul
>From many a thorn, from many thickets
Her fingers like a weaver's, quick and cool
And the light came from her body
And the night went through her grace
All summer long she touched me
And I knew her, I knew her face to face
And her dress was blue and silver
And her words were few and small
She is the vessel of the whole wide world
Mistress, oh mistress of us all
Dearly dead, Queen of Solitude
I thank you with my heart
For keeping me so close to Thee
While so many, oh so many stood apart
And the light came from her body
And the night went through her grace
All summer long she touched me
I knew her, I knew her face to face
Where where where
Is my Gypsy wife tonight
I've heard all the wild reports
They can't be right
But whose head is this she's dancing with
On the threshing-floor
Whose darkness deepens in her arms
A little more
And where where is my Gypsy wife tonight
The silver knives are flashing
In the tired old cafe
A ghost climbs on the table
In a bridal negligee
She says, My body is the light
My body is the way
I raise my arm against it all
And I catch the bride's bouquet
And where where is my Gypsy wife tonight
Too early for the Rainbow
Too early for the Dove
These are the Final Days, this is
The Darkness, this is the Flood
And there is no man or woman
Who can't be touched
But you who come between them
Will be judged
And where where is my Gypsy wife tonight
I've never seen your eyes so wide
I've never seen your appetite quite this occupied
Elsewhere is your feast of love I know
Long ago we agreed to keep it light
So lets be married one more night
It's light enough
To let it go
Remember when the scenery started fading
I held you 'til you learned to walk on air
So don't look down, the ground is gone,
There's no one waiting anyway
The Smoky Life is practiced everywhere
So set your restless heart at ease
Take a lesson from these autumn leaves
They waste no time waiting for the snow
Don't argue now or you'll be late
There is nothing to investigate
It's light enough
To let it go
Come on back if the moment lends
You can look up all my very closest friends
Light enough to let it go
Say a prayer for the cowboy
His mare's run away
And he'll walk til he finds her
His darling, his stray
But the river's in flood
And the roads are awash
And the bridges break up
In the panic of loss.
And there's nothing to follow
There's nowhere to go
She's gone like the summer
Gone like the snow
And the crickets are breaking
His heart with their song
As the day caves in
And the night is all wrong
Did he dream, was it she
Who went galloping past
And bent down the fern
Broke open the grass
And printed the mud with
The iron and the gold
That he nailed to her feet
When he was the lord
And although she goes grazing
A minute away
He tracks her all night
He tracks her all day
Oh blind to her presence
Except to compare
His injury here
With her punishment there
Then at home on a branch
In the highest tree
A songbird sings out
So suddenly
Ah the sun is warm
And the soft winds ride
On the willow trees
By the river side
Oh the world is sweet
The world is wide
And she's there where
The light and the darkness divide
And the steam's coming off her
She's huge and she's shy
And she steps on the moon
When she paws at the sky
And she comes to his hand
But she's not really tame
She longs to be lost
He longs for the same
And she'll bolt and she'll plunge
Through the first open pass
To roll and to feed
In the sweet mountain grass
Or she'll make a break
For the high plateau
Where there's nothing above
And there's nothing below
And it's time for the burden
It's time for the whip
Will she walk through the flame
Can he shoot from the hip
So he binds himself
To the galloping mare
And she binds herself
To the rider there
And there is no space
But there's left and right
And there is no time
But there's day and night
And he leans on her neck
And he whispers low
``Whither thou goest
I will go''
And they turn as one
And they head for the plain
No need for the whip
Ah, no need for the rein
Now the clasp of this union
Who fastens it tight?
Who snaps it asunder
The very next night
Some say the rider
Some say the mare
Or that love's like the smoke
Beyond all repair
But my darling says
``Leonard, just let it go by
That old silhouette
On the great western sky''
So I pick out a tune
And they move right along
And they're gone like the smoke
And they're gone like this song
Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Oh, let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone
Let me feel you moving like they do in Babylon
Show me slowly what I only know the limits of
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the wedding now, dance me on and on
Dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
We're both of us beneath our love, we're both of us above
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the children who are asking to be born
Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn
Raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I'm gathered safely in
Touch me with your naked hand or touch me with your glove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Maybe I'm still hurting
I can't turn the other cheek
But you know that I still love you
It's just that I can't speak
I looked for you in everyone
And they called me on that too
I lived alone but I was only
Coming back to you
Ah they're shutting down the factory now
Just when all the bills are due
And the fields they're under lock and key
Tho' the rain and the sun come through
And springtime starts but then it stops
In the name of something new
And all the senses rise against this
Coming back to you
And they're handing down my sentence now
And I know what I must do
Another mile of silence while I'm
Coming back to you
There are many in your life
And many still to be
Since you are a shining light
There's many that you'll see
But I have to deal with envy
When you choose the precious few
Who've left their pride on the other side of
Coming back to you
Even in your arms I know
I'll never get it right
Even when you bend to give me
Comfort in the night
I've got to have your word on this
Or none of it is true
And all I've said was just instead of
Coming back to you
How many times did you call me
And I knew it was late
I left everybody
But I never went straight
I don't claim to be guilty
But I do understand
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
Now my heart's like a blister
>From doing what I do
If the moon has a sister
It's got to be you
I'm going to miss you forever
Tho' it's not what I planned
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
There's a Law, there's an Arm, there's a Hand
Now the deal has been dirty