Hello fellow Beautiful Losers,
Just a poem today, although, I suppose, poems are never “just”.
I also want to share this song of LC’s, something I’ve been listening to a lot these days. Ana, my daughter, loves whenever he sings the chorus line “Everybody knows” and sometimes she says, “Everybody DOESN’T know, Leonard Cohen.”
Alas, I think she’s right.
Warm tidings & music,
Shannan
War Villanelle
The war is won. Who was it for: blackbirds, the Lord, red trees, gray lies. How dare you say we lost the war? We did think them human before our bombs engraved their eyes. The war is won. Who was it for? A map of dust the oceans conjure — our ashes a boat beneath smoke skies. How dare you say we lost the war? Who started it? I cannot remember your name as you rally the wounded: Oh how wise the war is! We won, but who was it for? Its tongue aching for flesh, a carnivore begs: I cannot again wear that green disguise. How dare you say we lost the war! Our children play as soldiers on shore. Pillage sandcastles, lay siege to seas with cries: The war is won. Who was it for? How dare you say we lost the war!
Going through old emails and recovered this double wonder (the second finding the Leobard Cohen YouTube Channel and this magnificent transcendent performance
Leonard Cohen's "The Partisan" is basically playing in my head 24/7 this past year. For reasons unknown, por supuesto.