“Leonard” 6×6, oil on canvas, $95.00 Buy Now
I’m grateful for all the stories I received. I’m out of them for now, but I’m hoping there are still a few of you who just haven’t e-mailed me yet ([email protected]).
I think day 12 contributor, Butch, sensed the desperation in my plea for more stories, and sent me an E-mail with the lyrics to a Leonard Cohen song.
A couple days ago I watched the Saturday Night Live clip of Kate Mckinnon as Hillary Clinton singing Cohen’s Hallelujah, a song that for years and in many contexts has moved me. It moved me again. Butch also sent me a quote from the NY times tribute to Cohen. I’ve read the full article a couple times now. It’s worth the read. I had trouble picking out just one piece of it to share here. The whole thing is quotable.
“Leonard had an unusual inflection for darkness: He found in it an occasion for uplift. His work is animated by a laudatory impulse, an unexpected and profoundly moving hunger to praise the world in full view of it. His attitude of acceptance was not founded on anything as cheap as happiness.
Leonard sang always as a sinner. He refused to describe sin as a failure or a disqualification. Sin was a condition of creatureliness, and his feeling for our creatureliness was boundless. “Even though it all went wrong/ I’ll stand before the Lord of song/ With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah!”
Today’s painting is inspired by the first lines of the song Butch sent me. I approached this painting differently than I do most. I wanted each brushstroke to show and the bright yellow square beneath the bird’s beak to be the star of the painting. That square is what made me want to paint this bird in the first place. Whereas I usually want to blur the line of background and foreground, I wanted this image to be composed of distinct pieces. I wanted it to be broken. I’m not sure how successful it is, but the process was immensely gratifying and required a focus I don’t usually bring to my work. Of course, I listened to a Leonard Cohen pandora station as I worked. That helped.
Anthem
Leonard Cohen
The birds they sang
at the break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don’t dwell on what
has passed away
or what is yet to be.
Ah the wars they will
be fought again
The holy dove
She will be caught again
bought and sold
and bought again
the dove is never free.
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
We asked for signs
the signs were sent:
the birth betrayed
the marriage spent
Yeah the widowhood
of every government —
signs for all to see.
I can’t run no more
with that lawless crowd
while the killers in high places
say their prayers out loud.
But they’ve summoned, they’ve summoned up
a thundercloud
and they’re going to hear from me.
Ring the bells that still can ring …
You can add up the parts
but you won’t have the sum
You can strike up the march,
there is no drum
Every heart, every heart
to love will come
but like a refugee.
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
That’s how the light gets in.
That’s how the light gets in.