One of my favorite Cohen lyrics is: "Crazy has places to hide in that are deeper than any goodbye." I saw Leonard and company on his second world tour. The experience was sacred, like being in a Church of the Soul. The way he reverently kneeled with hat over over heart while facing band members during their solos will forever be etched into my consciousness. He was grace embodied. Truly.
Once upon a time a woman I had met in the Florida Keys turned me onto Leonard Cohen, by given me several CDs of his music, which I took to playing anytime I drove my car somewhere. Sometime after she gave me that gift, she sent me this epic poem she said had just up and leaped out of her.
TIME TO CHOOSE
I cry out from my within my soul, a place filled with such grief that only
my subconscious ventures there
Out of fear of never returning from the guttural screams and wails, I
awake only to find the world to which I am returning, the war that is not
finished…..
The principalities, the powers, the unseen,
Einstein measured math and explained the unexplainable.
There is no formula for this world though, the war between good and evil.
It was attempted , the explanation many and many times in the past
with the Koran, the Bible, the tribal languages.
In writings and in generations passed down time and again.
The invisible weapons.
The Indians trying to explain a gun to the village.
No comprehension, no words to describe the terror of it.
The tribe saw his fear as he explained in terrifying images,
the death of his friend and brother.
The village looked on. Was he crazy? He tried so to convince them.
He warned them.
He knew the weapons would come on the shoulders of the evil warriors.
Calling for the heads of the Indians on a platter,
like John the Baptist, delivered.
Where were the laws of the U.S. then? Where were the Courts?
What was the difference? They called for the heads to be delivered on
platters.
They still do.
The principalities, the powers of darkness, calls for heads everyday.
And unknowingly you choose your side.
When the Indians, the homeless, the children are not worth standing and
fighting for, you have become a tool of darkness, watching the deliverance
of the Saints.
“Don’t be surprised when they hate you”, said Jesus, “for they hated me
first without a cause.”
But that is terrifying. Who wants to be hated?
We run a popularity contest in the U.S.
We can’t win, can’t succeed without our friends. Then what would be the
measure of our worth?
Jesus said his saints would be like the salt of the earth scattered abroad.
Some have lost their savor. How many are left?
Few, outnumbered, holding the ground, fighting the wars of the unseen.
And the village hears of the weapons and can’t imagine, so they prepare not.
How do you prepare for the unbelievable?
“Only with God, the armor of the Lord, and the Holy Spirit”, says Jesus.
But these words are pungent in the ears of the Christians, the civilized.
“No heads are called for”, they say. Yet they are, by Satan everyday.
And the idle stand by and do nothing as the saints are delivered,
And the idle claim innocence of the blood of it all,
because they carried not the gun to slaughter the Indians, the Jews, the
homeless, the children, the Saints.
But I tell you truth, idle ones, you are guilty!
You chose not to engage in the battle and the battle engaged you,
knowingly or not.
When you said, “No”, to the chosen, you said, “Yes” to Satan.
You said, “Yes, Satan carry on and deliver him on the platter, but I want
no part of it.”
You watched the slaughter but raised not a word in protest.
Fear of losing the popular friends, fear of becoming the salt of the earth
scattered about and preyed on by Satan and his devouring angels.
Why would Satan destroy one of his own? Of course not.
He would not target the idle, who allow him to deliver the heads on the
platters.
The ones he despises are the workers of God, the salt of the earth.
Where is their army, where is their law?
We believe we live by rules. We live by rules other than those we see.
The rules were written, they tell us the price.
They are written in the Bible, in the Holy books of old.
We read with our lips and see with our eyes but believe not in our heart.
Or we would become the salt, the persecuted, sawn asunder, living in
caves, destitute, beheaded, tortured in prison and so the Book goes.
And so the sale is void. There are no takers.
They want none of the hardships of the Lord elect.
Those promised, those delivered.
The idle fall by the wayside, planted shallow, planted on rocks,
Yielding nothing but thorns.
And Jesus says, “It is hard to kick against the pricks.”
The pricks of the fallen, the fence walkers, they will not choose a side.
The side is too torturous that bears the eternal promise.
The other side, Satan’s side, is full of success, victory in this world,
and awards and accolades.
The elect sleep without a home, without a country, alone with our wounds
with only God to comfort us.
Speaking to the unseen as our only friend.
“Too hard” the idle say. “Not appealing.”
Then go and take your reward. Sit alongside as they deliver the heads on
platters,
And know…. you will have your reward! For it is written.
It can’t be seen, but it is explained in the Book, the Bible;
You have chosen even if you refuse to.
You have chosen if you are not engaged.
You are not the salt of the earth if you are comforted, and popular.
No words of Jesus offered prosperity.
No words of Jesus have offered rewards here on earth.
Jesus spoke of trials and tribulations, and persecutions on earth.
Only above from the Father in a world yet to be seen, will our efforts be
rewarded.
In a world Einstein could not explain.
In a world where the formulas work, but no man can figure them out.
In a world too grand.
“Do you understand how I hung the moon and the stars?”, said God.
“Then how can you understand things greater?
They only heard from the Indian, who had seen the gun.
They didn’t recognize the evil ones who carried it.
Nor did they know when the evil ones would come,
or how many there would be.
But the heads have been called for and surely they will be delivered,
as always.
And the platters with the blood will be full,
And your hands will not be clean if you sit idly by,
And you will be rewarded with your portion for the killing.
Dylan, Lennon, Leonard, the word is, love is all there is, in the end, the beginning, but Wow, until then....terror, the horror of it all...... thanks for waking me up this morning with this distant 'love'.
Religion/God always seems to form a backdrop in so much of what he writes as though he can only attempt to define himself using one palette of stark black and white.
Oh and do y'all know about he and "Suzanne Takes Me Down to a Place by The River" And his Favorite Tea? It's called "Constant Comment" which also mine. And that Film "I'm Your Man" I'm nearing learning a lot of the lyrics and singers in it. If I watch it alone though I cry a lot. And laugh. And I "love Dance Me The Wedding"
Leonard - A man I have followed and know a lot of everything. He has such incredible quotes. Similary "I forgot what I was trying to remember" And "There's a Crack in Everything, that's how the light gets in"
I love Cohen's work. He expresses so passionately all of humanity's worst fears and nightmares while holding out that one ray of light and saving grace. My poem to him and all who suffer:
Let go of the darkness,
Let go of the fear,
The love you envision
Is already here.
But I think he already knew that. Deep down. Maybe we all do.
Because I’ve known this song I hear him singing it. Leonard Cohen was a force.
All of Cohen’s more cynical songs contain a ray of hope. “Love’s the only engine of survival.”
One of my favorite Cohen lyrics is: "Crazy has places to hide in that are deeper than any goodbye." I saw Leonard and company on his second world tour. The experience was sacred, like being in a Church of the Soul. The way he reverently kneeled with hat over over heart while facing band members during their solos will forever be etched into my consciousness. He was grace embodied. Truly.
Good remembrance of days gone by when we were all mellow callow fellows days of September.
Once upon a time a woman I had met in the Florida Keys turned me onto Leonard Cohen, by given me several CDs of his music, which I took to playing anytime I drove my car somewhere. Sometime after she gave me that gift, she sent me this epic poem she said had just up and leaped out of her.
TIME TO CHOOSE
I cry out from my within my soul, a place filled with such grief that only
my subconscious ventures there
Out of fear of never returning from the guttural screams and wails, I
awake only to find the world to which I am returning, the war that is not
finished…..
The principalities, the powers, the unseen,
Einstein measured math and explained the unexplainable.
There is no formula for this world though, the war between good and evil.
It was attempted , the explanation many and many times in the past
with the Koran, the Bible, the tribal languages.
In writings and in generations passed down time and again.
The invisible weapons.
The Indians trying to explain a gun to the village.
No comprehension, no words to describe the terror of it.
The tribe saw his fear as he explained in terrifying images,
the death of his friend and brother.
The village looked on. Was he crazy? He tried so to convince them.
He warned them.
He knew the weapons would come on the shoulders of the evil warriors.
Calling for the heads of the Indians on a platter,
like John the Baptist, delivered.
Where were the laws of the U.S. then? Where were the Courts?
What was the difference? They called for the heads to be delivered on
platters.
They still do.
The principalities, the powers of darkness, calls for heads everyday.
And unknowingly you choose your side.
When the Indians, the homeless, the children are not worth standing and
fighting for, you have become a tool of darkness, watching the deliverance
of the Saints.
“Don’t be surprised when they hate you”, said Jesus, “for they hated me
first without a cause.”
But that is terrifying. Who wants to be hated?
We run a popularity contest in the U.S.
We can’t win, can’t succeed without our friends. Then what would be the
measure of our worth?
Jesus said his saints would be like the salt of the earth scattered abroad.
Some have lost their savor. How many are left?
Few, outnumbered, holding the ground, fighting the wars of the unseen.
And the village hears of the weapons and can’t imagine, so they prepare not.
How do you prepare for the unbelievable?
“Only with God, the armor of the Lord, and the Holy Spirit”, says Jesus.
But these words are pungent in the ears of the Christians, the civilized.
“No heads are called for”, they say. Yet they are, by Satan everyday.
And the idle stand by and do nothing as the saints are delivered,
And the idle claim innocence of the blood of it all,
because they carried not the gun to slaughter the Indians, the Jews, the
homeless, the children, the Saints.
But I tell you truth, idle ones, you are guilty!
You chose not to engage in the battle and the battle engaged you,
knowingly or not.
When you said, “No”, to the chosen, you said, “Yes” to Satan.
You said, “Yes, Satan carry on and deliver him on the platter, but I want
no part of it.”
You watched the slaughter but raised not a word in protest.
Fear of losing the popular friends, fear of becoming the salt of the earth
scattered about and preyed on by Satan and his devouring angels.
Why would Satan destroy one of his own? Of course not.
He would not target the idle, who allow him to deliver the heads on the
platters.
The ones he despises are the workers of God, the salt of the earth.
Where is their army, where is their law?
We believe we live by rules. We live by rules other than those we see.
The rules were written, they tell us the price.
They are written in the Bible, in the Holy books of old.
We read with our lips and see with our eyes but believe not in our heart.
Or we would become the salt, the persecuted, sawn asunder, living in
caves, destitute, beheaded, tortured in prison and so the Book goes.
And so the sale is void. There are no takers.
They want none of the hardships of the Lord elect.
Those promised, those delivered.
The idle fall by the wayside, planted shallow, planted on rocks,
Yielding nothing but thorns.
And Jesus says, “It is hard to kick against the pricks.”
The pricks of the fallen, the fence walkers, they will not choose a side.
The side is too torturous that bears the eternal promise.
The other side, Satan’s side, is full of success, victory in this world,
and awards and accolades.
The elect sleep without a home, without a country, alone with our wounds
with only God to comfort us.
Speaking to the unseen as our only friend.
“Too hard” the idle say. “Not appealing.”
Then go and take your reward. Sit alongside as they deliver the heads on
platters,
And know…. you will have your reward! For it is written.
It can’t be seen, but it is explained in the Book, the Bible;
You have chosen even if you refuse to.
You have chosen if you are not engaged.
You are not the salt of the earth if you are comforted, and popular.
No words of Jesus offered prosperity.
No words of Jesus have offered rewards here on earth.
Jesus spoke of trials and tribulations, and persecutions on earth.
Only above from the Father in a world yet to be seen, will our efforts be
rewarded.
In a world Einstein could not explain.
In a world where the formulas work, but no man can figure them out.
In a world too grand.
“Do you understand how I hung the moon and the stars?”, said God.
“Then how can you understand things greater?
They only heard from the Indian, who had seen the gun.
They didn’t recognize the evil ones who carried it.
Nor did they know when the evil ones would come,
or how many there would be.
But the heads have been called for and surely they will be delivered,
as always.
And the platters with the blood will be full,
And your hands will not be clean if you sit idly by,
And you will be rewarded with your portion for the killing.
It is written.
Sandy Downs, Cudjoe Key
These words from your depths of being a brain salad surgery for the soul and so shine on you crazy diamond.
His most searing song, IMO. Leonard tells the truth.
The Future, one of Cohen's most important songs and best albums. There are many videos of him performing it live.
In the recent documentary about his song, Hallelujah, his process of working on this song for years is delved deeply into. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzm3VhTmPD0
I've read about his songwriting process in many interviews and articles.
"But songwriting was an agonizing, nonstop process for Cohen, leaving him “wrecked” and darkening thousands of notebook pages with revisions."
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/leonard-cohen-the-future/
Just another clever rich boy outa Westmount.
((()))?
Dylan, Lennon, Leonard, the word is, love is all there is, in the end, the beginning, but Wow, until then....terror, the horror of it all...... thanks for waking me up this morning with this distant 'love'.
He wasn’t wrong was he, to be fair……
Love his work.
Religion/God always seems to form a backdrop in so much of what he writes as though he can only attempt to define himself using one palette of stark black and white.
Woah. That got my attention.
Hear's listening in to musique in all its ragged glory.dave p red poppy art house.sf
Holy shit.
How re-appropriate for our times!?
Oh and do y'all know about he and "Suzanne Takes Me Down to a Place by The River" And his Favorite Tea? It's called "Constant Comment" which also mine. And that Film "I'm Your Man" I'm nearing learning a lot of the lyrics and singers in it. If I watch it alone though I cry a lot. And laugh. And I "love Dance Me The Wedding"
Leonard - A man I have followed and know a lot of everything. He has such incredible quotes. Similary "I forgot what I was trying to remember" And "There's a Crack in Everything, that's how the light gets in"
I love Cohen's work. He expresses so passionately all of humanity's worst fears and nightmares while holding out that one ray of light and saving grace. My poem to him and all who suffer:
Let go of the darkness,
Let go of the fear,
The love you envision
Is already here.
But I think he already knew that. Deep down. Maybe we all do.