Love's the only engine of survival

Leonard Cohen said it thirty years ago and maybe we're ready to listen now

Give me back my broken night
My mirrored room, my secret life
It's lonely here
There's no one left to torture
Give me absolute control
Over every living soul
And lie beside me, baby
That's an order

Give me crack and anal sex
Take the only tree that's left
And stuff it up the hole
In your culture
Give me back the Berlin wall
Give me Stalin and St. Paul
I've seen the future, brother
It is murder

Things are going to slide, slide in all directions
Won't be nothing (won't be nothing)
Nothing you can measure anymore
The blizzard, the blizzard of the world
Has crossed the threshold
And it's overturned
The order of the soul

When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)
I wonder what they meant
When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)
I wonder what they meant
When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)
I wonder what they meant

You don't know me from the wind
You never will, you never did
I'm the little Jew
Who wrote the Bible
I've seen the nations rise and fall
I've heard their stories, heard them all
But love's the only engine of survival
Your servant here, he has been told
To say it clear, to say it cold
It's over, it ain't going
Any further (do, do, do)
And now the wheels of heaven stop
You feel the devil's riding crop
Get ready for the future
It is murder (do, do, do)

You'll see a woman
Hanging upside down (ooh, ooh)
Her features covered by her fallen gown (ooh, ooh)
And all the lousy little poets
Coming round
Tryin' to sound like Charlie Manson
Yeah, the white man dancin'

Give me back the Berlin wall
Give me Stalin and St. Paul
Give me Christ or give me Hiroshima (do, do, do)
Destroy another fetus now
We don't like children anyhow
I've seen the future, baby
It is murder (do, do, do)

Things are going to slide, slide in all directions
Won't be nothing (won't be)
Nothing you can measure anymore
The blizzard, the blizzard of the world
Has crossed the threshold
And it's overturned
The order of the soul

When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)
I wonder what they meant
When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)
I wonder what they meant
When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)
I wonder what they meant

When they said (they said) repent (repent), repent (repent)

Cohen also wrote about the Dove, symbolizing Peace and how it is ‘never free’. That line also resonates and inspired me to create a new Substack image of a wounded dove. Created (stolen) from an image by Picasso, no less.

If you’re going to steal, steal from the master…