Today my creative writing group will be discussing songs. I am considering Leonard Cohen's song "Like a Bird on the Wire." As I searched for the perfect song, I realized that I am often drawn to songs that are sung by artists who are not especially valued for their voices! Leonard Cohen, Kris Kristofferson, Tom Waits. Of course, I tried to determine why this is so. Maybe it is just a coincidence. Maybe it is the irony that the song must stand on its own no matter who sings it.
Anyway, I chose Cohen's song because I thought it might be one that the group was not too familiar with, thus making it easier to "hear" it as a poem without the music to drive it along the memory. And coincidentally, it goes well with my slideshow of paintings!
Here are the lyrics.
LIKE A BIRD ON THE WIRE
by Leonard Cohen
Like a bird on the wire,
like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free.
Like a worm on a hook,
like a knight from some old fashioned book
I have saved all my ribbons for thee.
If I, if I have been unkind,
I hope that you can just let it go by.
If I, if I have been untrue
I hope you know it was never to you.
Like a baby, stillborn,
like a beast with his horn
I have torn everyone who reached out for me.
But I swear by this song
and by all that I have done wrong
I will make it all up to thee.
I saw a beggar leaning on his wooden crutch,
he said to me, "You must not ask for so much."
And a pretty woman leaning in her darkened door,
she cried to me, "Hey, why not ask for more?"
Oh like a bird on the wire,
like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free.
Today, I close with this:
"It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad."-- C. S. Lewis