The end of love
Leonard Cohen's song "Dance Me To The End Of Love" is a stunning piece of work. While I enjoy LC's version, I've been affected lately by Madeleine Peyroux's version...I think she does a bang-up job making you feel each lyric. If I were to do it over today, I might want her version of this song as the first dance at my wedding.
To me, it's a paean to all the best things about marriage and it's filled with little images and phrases that capture entire dimensions of being in a committed relationship. "Dance me through the panic" is nicely self-deprecating; "when the witnesses are gone" is funny; "like they do in Babylon" is sexy, as is the whole damn verse, albeit in an Old Testament kind of way (digression: perhaps all the Biblical references reinforce the timeless/poetic quality of the lyric); the beautiful, perfect word "asking" in the third verse; the acknowledgment of the torn threads in the last. And then the idea of "the end of love" itself...and what it means to dance towards it.
Madeleine's version of Dance Me To The End Of Love is here; Leonard intones it here.
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
To me, it's a paean to all the best things about marriage and it's filled with little images and phrases that capture entire dimensions of being in a committed relationship. "Dance me through the panic" is nicely self-deprecating; "when the witnesses are gone" is funny; "like they do in Babylon" is sexy, as is the whole damn verse, albeit in an Old Testament kind of way (digression: perhaps all the Biblical references reinforce the timeless/poetic quality of the lyric); the beautiful, perfect word "asking" in the third verse; the acknowledgment of the torn threads in the last. And then the idea of "the end of love" itself...and what it means to dance towards it.
Madeleine's version of Dance Me To The End Of Love is here; Leonard intones it here.
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
posted by Alex at 9:01 PM
1 Comments:
I thought about posting Tori Amos singing Famous Blue Raincoat, but decided against it.
This post made go and listen to that whole Peyroux album. It is growing on me.
You have to get past the whole Billie Holiday thing. Kinda like getting past Gould or Jarrett's moaning. Then you can let the goodness soak in.
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