Leonard Cohen
Leonard Norman Cohen was a Canadian singer-songwriter, poet and novelist. Cohen published his first book of poetry in Montreal in 1956 and his first novel in 1963.
Cohen's earliest songs (many of which appeared on the 1968 album Songs of Leonard Cohen) were rooted in European folk music melodies and instrumentation, sung in a high baritone. The 1970s were a musically restless period in which his influences broadened to encompass pop, cabaret, and world music. Since the 1980s he has typically sung in lower registers (bass baritone, sometimes bass), with accompaniment from electronic synthesizers and female backing singers.
His work often explores the themes of religion, isolation, sexuality, and complex interpersonal relationships.
Cohen's songs and poetry have influenced many other singer-songwriters, and more than a thousand renditions of his work have been recorded. He has been inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame and is also a Companion of the Order of Canada, the nation's highest civilian honour. Cohen was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 10, 2008 for his status among the "highest and most influential echelon of songwriters".
“a kite is a victim you are sure of.you love it because it pulls.”
“My heart sings of your longing for me, and my thoughts climb down to marvel at your mercy. I do not fear as you gather up my days. Your name is the sweetness of time, and you carry me close into the night, speaking consolations, drawing down lights from the sky, saying, See how the night has no terrors for one who remembers the name.”
“Your servant here, he has been toldto say it clear, to say it cold:It's over, it ain't goingany furtherAnd now the wheels of heaven stopyou feel the devil's riding cropGet ready for the future:it is murder ”
“I don't rememberlighting this cigaretteand I don't rememberif I'm here aloneor waiting for someone.”
“The last refuge of the insomniac is a sense of superiority to the sleeping world.”
“If your life is a leaf that the seasons tear off and condemn they will bind you with love that is graceful and green as a stem.”
“Well I see you there with the rose in your teethOne more thin gypsy thiefYes, and thanks, for the trouble you took from her eyesI thought it was there for good so I never tried.And Jane came by with a lock of your hairShe said that you gave it to herThat night that you planned to go clear”
“Garages, barns and attics are always older than the buildings to which they are attached.”
“Children show scars like medals. Lovers use them as a secrets to reveal. A scar is what happens when the word is made flesh.”
“There is a war between the ones who say there is a war and the ones who say there isn't.”
“I have often prayed for you like this Let me have her”
“Don't call yourself a secret unless you mean to keep it.”
“even damnation is poisoned with rainbows.”
“In our rags of light, all dressed to kill.”
“Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash.”
“I raise my glass to the Awful Truth, Which you can't reveal to the Ears of Youth,Except to say it isn't worth a dime,And the whole damn place goes crazy twice, And it's once for the Devil and once for Christ”
“In streams of light I clearly sawThe dust you seldom see,Out of which the Nameless makesA Name for one like me...All busy in the sunlightThe flecks did float and dance,And I was tumbled up with themIn formless circumstance.”
“Never make a decision when you need to pee.”
“Here's to the few who forgive what you do, and the fewer who don't even care”
“As our eyes grow accustomed to sight they armour themselves against wonder. ”
“It’s a pity if someone… has to console himself for the wreck of his days with the notion that somehow his voice, his work embodies the deepest, most obscure, freshest, rawest oyster of reality in the unfathomable refrigerator of the heart’s ocean, but I am such a one, and there you have it.”
“ordinary eternal machinery, like the grinding of the stars”
“I don't even hate books anymore.”
“i would like to remindthe managementthat the drinks are wateredand the hat-check girlhas syphilisand the band is composedof former ss monstersHowever since it isnew year's eveand i have lip canceri will place mypaper hat on myconcussion and dance”
“There is a crack in everything.That's how the light gets in.”