» by flahute in: Music on July 22nd, 2008 at 04:34:55 UTC |
I think it’s time again for a little Leonard Cohen Hallelujah action … it’s been just about 8 months since I posted Allison Crowe’s version of the song, and about 17 months since I posted the lyrics I’ve been able to determine from various different versions.
John Cale, who performed the song on the Basquiat soundtrack, did say that he got something like 15 pages (or at least 15 verses) from Leonard Cohen when he asked for a copy … I’d really love to see the other verses that I’ve not been able to gather.
In any case, Jeff Buckley and Rufus Wainwright both do wonderful versions of the song, although I have to admit, I find Jeff Buckley’s rendition to be far more powerful.
I stopped looking for you
I stopped waiting for you
I stopped dying for you
and I started dying for myself
I aged rapidly
I became fat in the face
and soft in the gut
and I forgot that I ever loved you
I was old
I had no focus, no mission
I wandered around eating and buying
bigger and bigger clothes
and I forgot why I hated
every long moment that was mine to fill
Why did you come back to me tonight
I can’t even get off this chair
Tears run down my cheeks
I am in love again
I can live like this
— Leonard Cohen (b. 1934), Canadian poet, composer, author
» by flahute in: Word Play on February 22nd, 2008 at 01:44:11 UTC |
ELEGY
Do not look for him
In brittle mountain streams:
They are too cold for any god;
And do not examine the angry rivers
For shreds of his soft body
Or turn the shore stones for his blood;
But in the warm salt ocean
He is descending through cliffs
Of slow green water
And the hovering coloured fish
Kiss his snow-bruised body
And build their secret nests
In his fluttering winding-sheet.
— Leonard Cohen (b. 1934), Canadian poet, composer, author
» by flahute in: Word Play on November 30th, 2007 at 05:12:24 UTC |
MERCY RETURNS ME
A woman I want —
An honour I covet —
A place where I want my mind to dwell —
Then Mercy returns me
To the triad
And the crisis of the song.
SWEET TIME
How sweet time feels
when it’s too late
and you don’t have to follow
her swinging hips
all the way into
your dying imagination
THE FLOOD
The flood it is gathering
Soon it will move
Across every valley
Against every roof
The body will drown
And the soul will break loose
I write all this down
But I don’t have the proof
Sinai, 1973
— Leonard Cohen (b. 1934), Canadian poet, novelist and singer-songwriter.
I’ve posted in the past about how much I love this song … Leonard Cohen is an incredible songwriter and poet; so I love finding different interpretations of his work.
This version, by Allison Crowe, is one of the more powerful and beautiful renditions I’ve ever heard.
» by flahute in: Word Play on October 12th, 2007 at 05:14:45 UTC |
THOUSANDS
Out of the thousands
who are known,
or who want to be known
as poets,
maybe one or two
are genuine
and the rest are fakes,
hanging around the sacred precincts
trying to look like the real thing.
Needless to say
I am one of the fakes,
and this is my story.
— Leonard Cohen (b. 1934), Canadian poet, novelist and singer-songwriter.
The cold seizes me
and I shiver
The wine
overthrows my tears
The night puts me to bed
and the sorrows
strengthen my resolve
Your name is burning
under a statue
Even when I was with you
I wanted to be here
The rain unhooks my belt
The wind gives a shape
to your absence
I move in and out
of the One Heart
no longer struggling
to be free
— Leonard Cohen (b. 1934), Canadian poet, novelist and singer-songwriter.
