Les Fleurs du L'amour

Leonard Cohen - A Thousand Kisses Deep (the poem)

You came to me this morning
And you handled me like meat.
You´d have to live alone to know
How good that feels, how sweet.
My mirror twin, my next of kin,
I´d know you in my sleep.
And who but you would take me in
A thousand kisses deep?

I loved you when you opened
Like a lily to the heat.
I´m just another snowman
Standing in the rain and sleet,
Who loved you with his frozen love
His second-hand physique -
With all he is, and all he was
A thousand kisses deep.

All soaked in sex, and pressed against
The limits of the sea:
I saw there were no oceans left
For scavengers like me.
We made it to the forward deck
I blessed our remnant fleet -
And then consented to be wrecked
A thousand kisses deep.

 I know you had to lie to me,
I know you had to cheat.
But the Means no longer guarantee
The Virtue in Deceit.
That truth is bent, that beauty spent,
That style is obsolete -
Ever since the Holy Spirit went
A thousand kisses deep.

(So what about this Inner Light
That´s boundless and unique?
I´m slouching through another night
A thousand kisses deep.)

I´m turning tricks; I´m getting fixed,
I´m back on Boogie Street.
I tried to quit the business -
Hey, I´m lazy and I´m weak.
But sometimes when the night is slow,
The wretched and the meek,
We gather up our hearts and go
A thousand kisses deep.

(And fragrant is the thought of you,
The file on you complete -
Except what we forgot to do
A thousand kisses deep.)

The ponies run, the girls are young,
The odds are there to beat.
You win a while, and then it´s done -
Your little winning streak.
And summoned now to deal
With your invincible defeat,
You live your life as if it´s real
A thousand kisses deep.

And I´m still working with the wine,
Still dancing cheek to cheek.
The band is playing “Auld Lang Syne” -
The heart will not retreat.
And maybe I had miles to drive,
And promises to keep -
You ditch it all to stay alive
A thousand kisses deep.

And now you are the Angel Death
And now the Paraclete;
And now you are the Savior’s Breath
And now the Belsen heap.
No turning from the threat of love,
No transcendental leap -
As witnessed here in time and blood
A thousand kisses deep.

All Thoughts Are Prey To Some Beast - Bill Callahan

Probably my favourite song, to me I read it as though it’s a poem about depression or those thoughts that come to consume you and drive all ability to think about simpler, less worrying things.

Bill Callahan described it as follows,

‘The eagle in this story is something that obliterates all other things; that is where the loneliness comes in. But if two people could be one eagle, then things would be alright. It is what we strive for. To be an eagle alone is hard to bear, but it may be the plight of some.’

Here it is.

The leafless tree looked like a brain
The birds within were all the thoughts and desires within me
Hopping around from branch to branch, or snug in their nests listening in

An eagle came over the horizon and shook the branches with its sight
The softer thoughts: starlings, finches, and wrens
The softer thoughts, they all took flight

The eagle looked clear through the brain tree, empty he thought save for me
Maybe I’ll make this one my home, consolidate the nests of the tiny
Raise a family of might like me

Then something struck him, wings of bone
Sweet desires and soft thoughts, were all gone
The eagle shrieked, “I’m alone”

Well it was time to flee the tree
The eagle snuck up on the wind one talon at a time
Being sky king of the sky, what did he have to fear
All thoughts are prey to some beast
All thoughts are prey to some beast

Sweet desire and soft thoughts, return to me
Sweet desire and soft thoughts, return to me

Exams

I spent the morning to now studying away in my small room; whilst the one I love sleeps/slept silently behind me having not slept the night before; from working away at an assignment. All i wanted to do was crawl into bed and hold her, hand on her stomach feeling the steady breathing of sleep and to share the air with her as her soft breathing pushed that air from her lungs. Alas, I must now leave this room and her sleeping away for the cold, windy and wet day outside to attend to my final exam.
But I’ll return :)

Herman Hesse

“There is no escape. You can’t be a vagabond and an artist and still be a solid citizen, a wholesome, upstanding person. You want to get drunk, so you have to accept the hangover. You say yes to the sunlight and pure fantasies, so you have to say yes to the filth and the nausea. Everything is within you, gold and mud, happiness and pain, the laughter of childhood and the apprehension of death. Say yes to everything, shirk nothing. Don’t try to lie to yourself. You are not a solid citizen. You are not a Greek. You are not harmonious, or the master of yourself. You are a bird in the storm. Let it storm! Let it drive you!”

lalalalalalalalalalalalaaaa-dea asked: http://weheartit.com/entry/10697199

THIS IS YOUR FUTURE HOUSE!
DEAL WITH IT.

I can dig this, but only if there’s a flying fox to reach the ground and some kind of basket-elevator invention to get back up. None of this ladder business

miscandnonsense asked: Would you mind very much if we lived in a tree house?

I could live in a tree house with you. Only if it’s either: like the Ewok colony or the Lost Boys’ tree house system in ‘Hook’.

lalalalalalalalalalalalaaaa-dea asked: Want to get lunch/coffee sometime this week?

That sounds good, I can do Wednesday. Exam and associated stuff Monday-Tuesday and work Thursday-Friday.

The Sleeper in the Valley

It’s a green hollow, where a river is singing
Crazily hanging on the grasses rags
Of silver; where the sun, from the proud mountain,
Is shinning: it’s a little valley bubbling with sunlight.

A young soldier, his mouth open, his head bare,
And the nape of his neck bathing in cool blue watercress,
Is sleeping; he is stretched out on the grass, under the skies,
Pale in his green bed where the light falls like rain.

Feet in the gladiolas, he is sleeping. Smiling like
a sick child would smile, he takes a nap:
Nature, rock him warmly: he is cold.

Fragrances do not make his nostrils quiver;
He sleeps in the sun, hand on the breast,
Peacefully. He has two red holes in his right side.

Arthur Rimbaud

miscandnonsense asked: I kinda want to be Indy too.
Maybe we can pretend?

You’d be better, you have the whole fear of snakes thing rocking. I’ll be ‘Short Round’ i.e. “Doctor Jones, Doctor Jones”…Temple of Doom