Red Pacem

If your neighbour disappears 

O if your neighbour disappears 

The quiet man who raked his lawn 

The girl who always took the sun 

Never mention it to your wife 

Never say at dinner time 

Whatever happened to that man 

Who used to rake his lawn 

Never say to your daughter

As you’re walking home from church

Funny thing about that girl

I haven’t seen her for a month

And if your son says to you

Nobody lives next door

They’ve all gone away

Send him to bed with no supper

Because it can spread, it can spread

And one fine evening coming home

Your wife and daughter and son

They’ll have caught the idea and will be gone.

Warning

The ancient craftsman smiled

       when I asked him to blow a bottle

       to keep your tears in.

And he smiled and hummed in rhythm with his

                                                          hands

       as he carved delicate glass

       and stained it with the purple

       of a drifting evening sky.

But the bottle is lost in a corner of my house.

How could I know you could not cry?

Folk Song

Oh the sisters of mercy, they are not departed or gone.

They were waiting for me when I thought that I just can't go on.

And they brought me their comfort and later they brought me this song.

Oh I hope you run into them, you who've been travelling so long.

Yes you who must leave everything that you cannot control.

It begins with your family, but soon it comes around to your soul.

Well I've been where you're hanging, I think I can see how you're pinned:

When you're not feeling holy, your loneliness says that you've sinned.

Well they lay down beside me, I made my confession to them.

They touched both my eyes and I touched the dew on their hem.

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.

When I left they were sleeping, I hope you run into them soon.

Don't turn on the lights, you can read their address by the moon.

And you won't make me jealous if I hear that they sweetened your night:

We weren't lovers like that and besides it would still be all right,

We weren't lovers like that and besides it would still be all right.

Sisters of Mercy

One noticed his hands, 

finely carved, 

almost the colour of jade, 

and the fingernails, 

pink and cultivated.

       He spoke of Art

       and of poetry

       and held us with descriptions

       of the Masters.

Often when walking

he sang fragments

of austere Spanish songs

from the Court of Ferdinand, 

and quoted Dante

accurately and often.

       But in his lapel, 

       discreetly, 

       he wore a sprig of asphodel.

Satan in Westmount

 Leonard Cohen – Let Us Compare Mythologies (1956)