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	November 22, 2003

'AND I'M LEFT TO CONCLUDE THERE'S NO HUMAN ANSWER NEAR' As I get older I find I get essential solace and renewal from music, especially music of the remarkable years from the late 1960s to the early 1970s, when we all thought we could save the world. One of my favourite musician-songwriters from that period is Ottawa's Bruce Cockburn. A pilgrimmage to Le Hibou coffeehouse to see Bruce or one of the many other great folk artists and poets of the day was the Canadian equivalent of a trip to the Village to see Bob Dylan. In the early 1970s, Bruce was at the top of his form, turning out lyrics at once angry and poetic, underlined by rich, unique and challenging guitar riffs. He turned out two really exceptional albums, Joy Will Find a Way and In the Falling Dark that I think are among the best albums of their genre. If you've never heard his music, you can buy it here, and listen to some samples here. His poetry is exemplary in its own right, and I found his words and music immensely cathartic last week, a week of disheartening news, watching our society's seemingly hopeless decline into endless violence, terror, retribution and rage. Here are the lyrics from three of his songs from the above two albums. Gavin's Woodpile Working out on Gavin's woodpile Safe within the harmony of kin Visions begin to crowd my eyes Like a meteor shower in the autumn skies And the soil beneath me seems to moan With a sound like the wind through a hollow bone And my mind fills with figures like Lappish runes of power And log slams on rough-hewn log And a voice from somewhere scolds a barking dog. I remember a bleak-eyed prisoner In the Stoney Mountain life-suspension home You drink and fight and damage someone And they throw you away for some years of boredom One year done and five more to go -- No job waiting so no parole And over and over they tell you that you're nothing... and I toss another log on Gavin's woodpile and wonder at the lamp-warm window's welcome smile. I remember crackling embers Coloured windows shining through the rain Like the coloured slicks on The English River Death in the marrow and death in the liver And some government gambler with his mouth full of steak Saying, "If you can't eat the fish, fish in some other lake. To watch a people die -- it is no new thing." And the stack of wood grows higher and higher And a helpless rage seems to set my brain on fire. And everywhere the free space fills Like a punctured diving suit and i'm Paralyzed in the face of it all Cursed with the curse of these modern times Distant mountains, blue and liquid, Luminous like a thickening of sky Flash in my mind like a stairway to life -- A train whistle cuts through the scene like a knife Three hawks wheel in a dazzling sky -- A slow motion jet makes them look like a lie And I'm left to conclude there's no human answer near... In the Falling Dark And the lights lie tumbled out like gems The moon is nothing but a toothless grin Floating out on the evening wind The smell of sweat and lube oil pervades the night And the rush of life in flight at the speed of light A million footsteps whispering A guitar sounds -- some voices sing Smoke on the breeze -- eyes that sting Far in the east a yellow cloud bank climbs Stretching away to be part of tomorrow's time Earthbound while everything expands So many grains of sand Slipping from hand to hand Catching the light and falling into dark The world fades out like an overheard remark In the falling dark Light pours from a million radiant lives Off of kids and dogs and the hard-shelled husbands and wives All that glory shining around and we're all caught taking a dive And all the beasts of the hills around shout, "such a waste! Don't you know that from the first to the last we're all one in the gift of grace!" A Long-Time Love Song Can't trace this conversation -- Words fragment and fall Into blue shadows by a white-baked wall. Through shimmering spaces a single thrush calls -- A song when it's over is no song at all And you know I long to feel that sail Leaping in the wind And i long to see what lies beyond that rim Oh, ever-new lover and friend Sing me that love song again. Time measured in summersaults And flickering kids' play -- Cross-world and southward it's a fine summer day Translucent life-span evaporates away To bead on the cool grass in a cyclic ballet Oh, damn it, I'm crying again. Gotta get some sleep. Postscript: The image above is of a painting by Canadian artist Alex Colville entitled "Horse & Train". Bruce used it as cover art for one of his albums and wrote "The horse seems to contain such energy, as if it were a charged particle of pure spirit. This sense of spirit, in confrontation with material power, is something any artist can relate to. A sense of impending doom, too, I think". The painting hangs in the National Gallery of Canada. 10:39:48 AM  trackback []  comment []

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