Leonard Cohen: Like any dealer, he was watching for the card that is so high and wild he'll never need to deal another.
Leonard Cohen, Isle of Wight 1970
Stranger Song
More nuggets that inform my life came out of this plaintive song and from that whole first album than it is healthy to admit. I still remember the small apartment in Montreal where I first heard his music with a bunch of other angsty teenagers.
A sample of the sound bites that constantly rattle in my brain from that one song:
Reaching for the sky just to surrender.
Please understand I never had a secret chart, to get me to the heart of this or any other matter.
You hate to watch another tired man lay down his hand like he was giving up the holy game of poker.
And of course, I am still to this day:
...watching for the card that is so high and wild (I'll) never need to deal another.
The card that is so high and wild I'll never need to deal another.
Does it really exist? I am still watching. And waiting.
Watching and waiting in CLL has a whole other meaning. It is a wait and see stance: how is the disease behaving, and then ignore it or respond to it depending on whether it is being nasty or nice. I am long past that pleasant interlude of plausible denial. All my chips are in the game now and I grabbed what I believe to be my best card on the table. In a trial. And even it's only advertising one more shelter I can live with that.
On the Isle of Wight, Leonard performed infront of 600,000 in the early morning of August 31, 1970 not long after the final live performance of Jimi Hendrix. Talk about a change of pace. Are you experienced?
And 43 years later, the self proclaimed grocer of despair is still delivering.
Sorry for another brief diversion but where would I be without music. Cohen's song are always humming in the back of my head, and this is one of the most persistent.
Back to work. Will be blogging again this weekend.
Labels: Isle of Wight, Leonard Cohen, Music, Poker, Stranger Song
posted by Brian Koffman at
12:37 PM
2 Comments:
We saw Leonard Cohen in concert about 6 months ago. He is more my husband's cup of tea rather than mine; but he put on the most marvellous concert. We both really enjoyed the show, he sang for about 3 hours. A great performer.
Chag Sameach from cold snowy London Town
Susan
I had tickets to see Leonard in Berlin twice, 81, and 82. Both times due to to illness of a parent, I missed the concerts. Then he stopped touring.
When his tour was announced in 2008, July 16th Edinburgh Castle, I sat on the phone until I got through, and got tickets.
That night was amazing, the voice was just the same 'I knew the words of every song' :-), it was awesome. I saw him again a few years later in Leeds.
His final album is a self penned eulogy, he knew he was dying, his message to Marianne made that clear. Asd with many CLL sufferers, he feel and hit his head, the uncontrolled bleeding killed him in his sleep.
Go with God Leonard, you were a man.
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