Words of Love.

When I woke up this morning I had So Long Marianne by Leonard Cohen in my head. That is because the last thing I watched on the telly last night was a film by Nick Broomfield called Leonard & Marianne, Words Of Love. I have seen it before, but it is well worth watching again. After it finished, I was wondering what became of Marianne’s son Axel. I found out that he has been living in a psychiatric institution in Norway for many years, which is a very sad postscript to the film and shows the dark side of the counterculture of the 1960s. I was pleased to see contributions by Judy Collins who first popularised Leonard’s songs, and the late Julie Felix who I had the pleasure of meeting briefly at Glastonbury on two occasions.

The best way to get a song out of your head is to play it, so I put on Leonard Cohen, Greatest Hits in my kitchen and sat there with a cup of tea listening to the songs. Watching the clouds drifting by through the kitchen window seemed to perfectly compliment the music, every few minutes the wintery sky would change from blue to slate grey. The starlings were on guard duty on top of their tree and further away a solitary wood pigeon reminded me of Bird On A Wire. There is a line in that song which says, Like a drunk in a midnight choir. That reminds me of going to Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve in our local Catholic church. Some of the congregation had obviously been in the pub beforehand! I think the song that I have grown to like the most over the years is Chelsea Hotel which is about Leonard’s relationship with Janis Joplin. In my view, more than any other singer-songwriter his songs are really poetry set to music.

That reminds me, I said I would tell you about the books I found recently. I went over to Warminster on Friday for the first time in ages to see Sian. I left her in Wetherspoons while I had a quick scoot around the charity shops. In the Red Cross shop, I found a nice hardback first edition novel by Naomi Ishiguro called Common Ground. She is the daughter of Kazuo Ishiguro who wrote The Remains Of The Day and other great books, so I’m looking forward to reading that. In the Dorothy House shop, I found a whole heap of nice poetry books. A Snail In My Prime by Paul Durcan. I discovered his work when he co-wrote The Days Before Rock And Roll with Van Morrison. I got even more interested when I found out that he was brought up in County Mayo which is where my family came from. I found a book about D.H. Lawrence by Anais Nin who I like because of her association with Henry Miller. 

A book by Sinead Morrissey who I know nothing about, but like her name. Also, books by Charles Simic and Linda Lamus who I also don’t know, but I liked the covers. All these books were in beautiful condition and only £1.00 each, so I was well chuffed to find them. There is a danger of my house being full of books and music, but that is no bad thing is it. Anyway, after Leonard had stopped singing this morning, I decided to go back to bed where it is nice and warm. I was just re-entering the land of Nod when there was a knock on my front door. “Hang on”, I shouted, running downstairs. It was the postman with a package for me. I’ll tell you all about what was in it tomorrow.