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| Romance, regrets and notebooks in the freezer: Leonard Cohen’s son on his father’s final poems | Romance, regrets and notebooks in the freezer: Leonard Cohen’s son on his father’s final poems |
| (4 months later) | |
| Was he, in the end, a musician or a poet? A grave philosopher or a grim sort of comedian? A cosmopolitan lady’s man or a profound, ascetic seeker? Jew or Buddhist? Hedonist or hermit? Across his 82 years, the Montreal-born Leonard Cohen was all of these things – and in his posthumous book of poetry, given the Lawrentian title The Flame by his son Adam, all sides of the man are present. | Was he, in the end, a musician or a poet? A grave philosopher or a grim sort of comedian? A cosmopolitan lady’s man or a profound, ascetic seeker? Jew or Buddhist? Hedonist or hermit? Across his 82 years, the Montreal-born Leonard Cohen was all of these things – and in his posthumous book of poetry, given the Lawrentian title The Flame by his son Adam, all sides of the man are present. |
| Other than that, Adam Cohen won’t say much more. “This was all private,” he says, sitting in an office on Los Angeles’s Wilshire Boulevard, near the house where his dad passed away after a late-night fall almost two years ago. “My father was very interested in preserving the magic of his process. And moreover, not demystifying it. Speaking of any of this,” he says, his voice dropping to a whisper, “is a transgression.” But after a few more remarks – stressing that Cohen wrote entirely in solitude, that he would consider discussion of his work a dangerous sort of “vanity” – Adam describes his late father, his sense of himself, and the heart of his achievement reasonably well. | Other than that, Adam Cohen won’t say much more. “This was all private,” he says, sitting in an office on Los Angeles’s Wilshire Boulevard, near the house where his dad passed away after a late-night fall almost two years ago. “My father was very interested in preserving the magic of his process. And moreover, not demystifying it. Speaking of any of this,” he says, his voice dropping to a whisper, “is a transgression.” But after a few more remarks – stressing that Cohen wrote entirely in solitude, that he would consider discussion of his work a dangerous sort of “vanity” – Adam describes his late father, his sense of himself, and the heart of his achievement reasonably well. |
| He’d call himself slow. He’d write poems about how Leonard Cohen was a lazy bastard living in a suit | He’d call himself slow. He’d write poems about how Leonard Cohen was a lazy bastard living in a suit |
| “It’s all song, and it’s all poetry – for him there wasn’t any delineation,” he says of the decades of wrestling over the nature of his father’s gift. To Cohen himself, though, it was never enough. “He’d call himself slow,” Adam says. “He’d write poems about how Leonard Cohen was a lazy bastard living in a suit.” In fact, Cohen was a fierce perfectionist, devoted to an almost impossible level of rigour, and the bearer of what his son calls “a monastic discipline”. | “It’s all song, and it’s all poetry – for him there wasn’t any delineation,” he says of the decades of wrestling over the nature of his father’s gift. To Cohen himself, though, it was never enough. “He’d call himself slow,” Adam says. “He’d write poems about how Leonard Cohen was a lazy bastard living in a suit.” In fact, Cohen was a fierce perfectionist, devoted to an almost impossible level of rigour, and the bearer of what his son calls “a monastic discipline”. |
| Adam nods toward a finished copy of the book: “This is what he was staying alive for.” Cohen had leukaemia, and dropped hints about his impending demise on You Want It Darker, his final album. (“I’m leaving the table / I’m out of the game,” he sings on one of its tracks.) | Adam nods toward a finished copy of the book: “This is what he was staying alive for.” Cohen had leukaemia, and dropped hints about his impending demise on You Want It Darker, his final album. (“I’m leaving the table / I’m out of the game,” he sings on one of its tracks.) |
| “He was a man on a quest, on a mission,” Adam says, describing his father’s increasing sense of purpose and dedication in his last months, which included sending “do not disturb” emails to friends and family so he could finish the project. “That probably bought him some time on Earth.” | “He was a man on a quest, on a mission,” Adam says, describing his father’s increasing sense of purpose and dedication in his last months, which included sending “do not disturb” emails to friends and family so he could finish the project. “That probably bought him some time on Earth.” |
| Countless rock singers, from folkies to CBGBs punks, have been lazily dubbed “poetic” but Cohen was, by any measure, the real thing: he published no fewer than four books of verse, across a decade, before the release of his first LP, the mostly acoustic, finger-picked Songs of Leonard Cohen, which led off with the undeniably poetic “Suzanne”. (Oddly, he made early forays into music as a teenager, forming a country-folk band with friends called the Buckskin Boys, but he mostly let music drop until the release of his debut at age 33.) Those first poems emerged from a close-knit group of Canadian versifiers reading stanzas to each other in cafes and flats, printing mimeographed copies. “There were no prizes or grants or awards,” Cohen said in a 1993 radio interview. “There weren’t even any girls.” It seems appropriate that his last words – despite the power of You Want It Darker, released weeks before his death – would come in the form of a posthumous book of verse. | Countless rock singers, from folkies to CBGBs punks, have been lazily dubbed “poetic” but Cohen was, by any measure, the real thing: he published no fewer than four books of verse, across a decade, before the release of his first LP, the mostly acoustic, finger-picked Songs of Leonard Cohen, which led off with the undeniably poetic “Suzanne”. (Oddly, he made early forays into music as a teenager, forming a country-folk band with friends called the Buckskin Boys, but he mostly let music drop until the release of his debut at age 33.) Those first poems emerged from a close-knit group of Canadian versifiers reading stanzas to each other in cafes and flats, printing mimeographed copies. “There were no prizes or grants or awards,” Cohen said in a 1993 radio interview. “There weren’t even any girls.” It seems appropriate that his last words – despite the power of You Want It Darker, released weeks before his death – would come in the form of a posthumous book of verse. |
| As a young man, Cohen’s favourite poet was perhaps Federico García Lorca; he’d later name his daughter after the doomed Spaniard. But his sense of the art stretched back thousands of years and great writing would, he knew, outlive what he saw as his own meagre contributions. “He could recite to the letter,” Adam says. “Byron, Shakespeare, Rumi, the Bible … The guy was outrageously fluent.” Cohen once said his training, and sense of vocation, went back to Robert Burns, the French troubadours, Homer and King David. Adam calls his style “mytho-romantic,” which seems as good a term as any. | As a young man, Cohen’s favourite poet was perhaps Federico García Lorca; he’d later name his daughter after the doomed Spaniard. But his sense of the art stretched back thousands of years and great writing would, he knew, outlive what he saw as his own meagre contributions. “He could recite to the letter,” Adam says. “Byron, Shakespeare, Rumi, the Bible … The guy was outrageously fluent.” Cohen once said his training, and sense of vocation, went back to Robert Burns, the French troubadours, Homer and King David. Adam calls his style “mytho-romantic,” which seems as good a term as any. |
| Cohen was an exacting reader of the verse of others. In 2005, he sued his longtime business manager, a decade or so after she began taking his money. “He didn’t know where the accountant was cheating,” Adam says. “But you could present him with a poem, and he could tell where the poet was cheating.” For Cohen, faking it was not an option: his own work, Adam says, “was a mandate from God”. | Cohen was an exacting reader of the verse of others. In 2005, he sued his longtime business manager, a decade or so after she began taking his money. “He didn’t know where the accountant was cheating,” Adam says. “But you could present him with a poem, and he could tell where the poet was cheating.” For Cohen, faking it was not an option: his own work, Adam says, “was a mandate from God”. |
| In the same way it’s hard to imagine Cohen with even an untucked shirt – in later life he almost always appeared in full suit and tie, typically with brimmed hat and leather shoes – it’s difficult to conceive of an unfinished song, a number that would have been improved with an additional verse, or played in a different key. | In the same way it’s hard to imagine Cohen with even an untucked shirt – in later life he almost always appeared in full suit and tie, typically with brimmed hat and leather shoes – it’s difficult to conceive of an unfinished song, a number that would have been improved with an additional verse, or played in a different key. |
| For his final publication, he left almost nothing to chance. Unlike, say, the mass of work, unfinished and otherwise, that often appears after a writer or musician dies – the endless songs and demos authorised by the Jimi Hendrix estate, for instance, or the obsessive mining of Tolkien’s Middle-earth – The Flame shows the emphasis Cohen put on distillation. “Nothing about this book,” Adam says, “is haphazard.” | For his final publication, he left almost nothing to chance. Unlike, say, the mass of work, unfinished and otherwise, that often appears after a writer or musician dies – the endless songs and demos authorised by the Jimi Hendrix estate, for instance, or the obsessive mining of Tolkien’s Middle-earth – The Flame shows the emphasis Cohen put on distillation. “Nothing about this book,” Adam says, “is haphazard.” |
| Reading the notebooks is a bittersweet experience: here are the seeds of Cohen songs we never got to hear | Reading the notebooks is a bittersweet experience: here are the seeds of Cohen songs we never got to hear |
| Though Cohen came up during the beat era and admired Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, the cult of spontaneity never appealed to him. (“That’s never worked for me,” he said in 1993. “My first thoughts are dull, are prejudiced, are poisonous. I find last thought, best thought.”) | Though Cohen came up during the beat era and admired Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, the cult of spontaneity never appealed to him. (“That’s never worked for me,” he said in 1993. “My first thoughts are dull, are prejudiced, are poisonous. I find last thought, best thought.”) |
| The Flame is divided, as per Cohen’s instructions, into three sections, and organised by editors Robert Faggen and Alexandra Pleshoyano, scholars in California and Quebec respectively. The first is a selection of 63 poems, some of which have been published before, going back several decades. Adam calls the first, “Happens to the Heart,” the “blueprint” of the entire collection. Most of it is in rhyme and metre; at least half could be described as light verse. | The Flame is divided, as per Cohen’s instructions, into three sections, and organised by editors Robert Faggen and Alexandra Pleshoyano, scholars in California and Quebec respectively. The first is a selection of 63 poems, some of which have been published before, going back several decades. Adam calls the first, “Happens to the Heart,” the “blueprint” of the entire collection. Most of it is in rhyme and metre; at least half could be described as light verse. |
| The second section reprints the lyrics (sometimes differing from their recorded versions) from Cohen’s last three albums, plus “Blue Alert”, a 2006 recording by his former backing vocalist and romantic partner Anjani Thomas. (Cohen produced and wrote the lyrics.) On the page, the poise and polish of these songs remain striking. | The second section reprints the lyrics (sometimes differing from their recorded versions) from Cohen’s last three albums, plus “Blue Alert”, a 2006 recording by his former backing vocalist and romantic partner Anjani Thomas. (Cohen produced and wrote the lyrics.) On the page, the poise and polish of these songs remain striking. |
| The third part is a selection from Cohen’s notebooks – distilled from more than 3,000 pages across roughly 60 years, up to and including, apparently, the day he died. A 2001 acceptance speech for a Spanish award serves as a brief coda. (There is also an email exchange with a friend; even his online correspondence seems to be in rhyme and metre.) | The third part is a selection from Cohen’s notebooks – distilled from more than 3,000 pages across roughly 60 years, up to and including, apparently, the day he died. A 2001 acceptance speech for a Spanish award serves as a brief coda. (There is also an email exchange with a friend; even his online correspondence seems to be in rhyme and metre.) |
| Included in various proportions are love, sex, death, regret, exaltation, piety and gentle fondness. The blending of the earthy with the spiritual – in his last years Cohen was as influenced by a Hindu teacher as much as the Buddhist guru he studied with on a California mountain – would give John Donne and Marvin Gaye a run for their money. | Included in various proportions are love, sex, death, regret, exaltation, piety and gentle fondness. The blending of the earthy with the spiritual – in his last years Cohen was as influenced by a Hindu teacher as much as the Buddhist guru he studied with on a California mountain – would give John Donne and Marvin Gaye a run for their money. |
| Throughout the book are sketches by Cohen, mostly self-portraits, with a few, unsurprisingly, of musical instruments and topless women. Even as the body failed, the flame of Cohen’s libido seemed to continue burning. | Throughout the book are sketches by Cohen, mostly self-portraits, with a few, unsurprisingly, of musical instruments and topless women. Even as the body failed, the flame of Cohen’s libido seemed to continue burning. |
| While the notebooks are uneven, reading them makes for a bittersweet experience: it’s hard not to see these as the seeds of Cohen songs we never got to hear, finished poems we’ll never get to read. | While the notebooks are uneven, reading them makes for a bittersweet experience: it’s hard not to see these as the seeds of Cohen songs we never got to hear, finished poems we’ll never get to read. |
| But Cohen never rushed his output, and could go almost a decade between albums. This wasn’t because ideas and images didn’t flow: he apparently filled notebooks every day of his life, and Adam describes finding them, as a child, in the poet’s desk drawers and jacket pockets, even, later, while seeking a bottle of tequila, coming upon a chilled, forgotten notebook in the freezer. | But Cohen never rushed his output, and could go almost a decade between albums. This wasn’t because ideas and images didn’t flow: he apparently filled notebooks every day of his life, and Adam describes finding them, as a child, in the poet’s desk drawers and jacket pockets, even, later, while seeking a bottle of tequila, coming upon a chilled, forgotten notebook in the freezer. |
| This is an artist who worked on a single song – what would become “Hallelulah” – for several years, writing 80 drafts and as many verses, only to have it rejected by his record label. (The final, much shorter, version became, after covers by John Cale and Jeff Buckley, Cohen’s most recorded song.) | This is an artist who worked on a single song – what would become “Hallelulah” – for several years, writing 80 drafts and as many verses, only to have it rejected by his record label. (The final, much shorter, version became, after covers by John Cale and Jeff Buckley, Cohen’s most recorded song.) |
| He wasn’t, then, one to dash things off. Despite the generous and world-weary humour that emerged in his last decades, – his early, folkie work was denounced as “humourless” –the task of writing was deadly serious. He surely knew the line from Yeats – a poet he deeply admired – about how “The intellect of man is forced to choose / Perfection of the life, or of the work.” On this wager, Cohen was unambiguous. | He wasn’t, then, one to dash things off. Despite the generous and world-weary humour that emerged in his last decades, – his early, folkie work was denounced as “humourless” –the task of writing was deadly serious. He surely knew the line from Yeats – a poet he deeply admired – about how “The intellect of man is forced to choose / Perfection of the life, or of the work.” On this wager, Cohen was unambiguous. |
| “Religion, teachers, women, drugs, the road, fame, money,” Adam quotes his father saying; “nothing gets me high and offers relief from the suffering like blackening pages, writing.” It was also, he writes in his foreword, “a statement of regret”, since Cohen sacrificed so much – he never married, considered himself a poor father, let his health and financial state decline – for the Muse. Amidst numerous liaisons and botched relationships, poetry is the one thing he remained entirely faithful to. The Flame is the incontrovertible proof. | “Religion, teachers, women, drugs, the road, fame, money,” Adam quotes his father saying; “nothing gets me high and offers relief from the suffering like blackening pages, writing.” It was also, he writes in his foreword, “a statement of regret”, since Cohen sacrificed so much – he never married, considered himself a poor father, let his health and financial state decline – for the Muse. Amidst numerous liaisons and botched relationships, poetry is the one thing he remained entirely faithful to. The Flame is the incontrovertible proof. |
| Happens to the Heart | Happens to the Heart |
| I was always working steady But I never called it artI was funding my depression Meeting Jesus reading Marx Sure it failed my little fire But it’s bright the dying spark Go tell the young messiah What happens to the heart | I was always working steady But I never called it artI was funding my depression Meeting Jesus reading Marx Sure it failed my little fire But it’s bright the dying spark Go tell the young messiah What happens to the heart |
| There’s a mist of summer kisses Where I tried to double-park The rivalry was viciousAnd the women were in charge It was nothing, it was business But it left an ugly markSo I’ve come here to revisit What happens to the heart | There’s a mist of summer kisses Where I tried to double-park The rivalry was viciousAnd the women were in charge It was nothing, it was business But it left an ugly markSo I’ve come here to revisit What happens to the heart |
| I was selling holy trinketsI was dressing kind of sharp Had a pussy in the kitchen And a panther in the yardIn the prison of the giftedI was friendly with the guard So I never had to witness What happens to the heart | I was selling holy trinketsI was dressing kind of sharp Had a pussy in the kitchen And a panther in the yardIn the prison of the giftedI was friendly with the guard So I never had to witness What happens to the heart |
| I should have seen it comingYou could say I wrote the chart Just to look at her was troubleIt was trouble from the startSure we played a stunning couple But I never liked the partIt ain’t pretty, it ain’t subtleWhat happens to the heart | I should have seen it comingYou could say I wrote the chart Just to look at her was troubleIt was trouble from the startSure we played a stunning couple But I never liked the partIt ain’t pretty, it ain’t subtleWhat happens to the heart |
| Now the angel’s got a fiddle And the devil’s got a harpEvery soul is like a minnow Every mind is like a sharkI’ve opened every windowBut the house, the house is dark Just say Uncle, then it’s simple What happens to the heart | Now the angel’s got a fiddle And the devil’s got a harpEvery soul is like a minnow Every mind is like a sharkI’ve opened every windowBut the house, the house is dark Just say Uncle, then it’s simple What happens to the heart |
| I was always working steadyBut I never called it artThe slaves were there already The singers chained and charred Now the arc of justice bending And the injured soon to marchI lost my job defending What happens to the heart | I was always working steadyBut I never called it artThe slaves were there already The singers chained and charred Now the arc of justice bending And the injured soon to marchI lost my job defending What happens to the heart |
| I studied with this beggarHe was filthy he was scarred By the claws of many women He had failed to disregard No fable here no lessonNo singing meadowlarkJust a filthy beggar blessing What happens to the heart | I studied with this beggarHe was filthy he was scarred By the claws of many women He had failed to disregard No fable here no lessonNo singing meadowlarkJust a filthy beggar blessing What happens to the heart |
| I was always working steady But I never called it artI could lift, but nothing heavy Almost lost my union cardI was handy with a rifleMy father’s .303We fought for something final Not the right to disagree | I was always working steady But I never called it artI could lift, but nothing heavy Almost lost my union cardI was handy with a rifleMy father’s .303We fought for something final Not the right to disagree |
| Sure it failed my little fireBut it’s bright the dying spark Go tell the young messiah What happens to the heart | Sure it failed my little fireBut it’s bright the dying spark Go tell the young messiah What happens to the heart |
| June 24, 2016 | June 24, 2016 |
| Flying Over Iceland | Flying Over Iceland |
| over Reykjavik, the “smokey bay” where W.H. Auden wentto discover the backgroundof all our songs,where I myself was receivedby the Mayor and the President(600 miles an hour30,000 feet599 miles an hourmy old street number on Belmont Ave) where I, a second-raterby any estimation,was honoured by the noblestand handsomest people of the West served with lobsterand strong drink,and I never cared about eyesbut the eyes of the waitresswere so alarmingly mauvethat I fell into a tranceand ate the forbidden shellfish | over Reykjavik, the “smokey bay” where W.H. Auden wentto discover the backgroundof all our songs,where I myself was receivedby the Mayor and the President(600 miles an hour30,000 feet599 miles an hourmy old street number on Belmont Ave) where I, a second-raterby any estimation,was honoured by the noblestand handsomest people of the West served with lobsterand strong drink,and I never cared about eyesbut the eyes of the waitresswere so alarmingly mauvethat I fell into a tranceand ate the forbidden shellfish |
| I Pray for Courage | I Pray for Courage |
| I pray for courage Now I’m oldTo greet the sickness And the cold | I pray for courage Now I’m oldTo greet the sickness And the cold |
| I pray for courage In the nightTo bear the burden Make it light | I pray for courage In the nightTo bear the burden Make it light |
| I pray for courageIn the timeWhen suffering comes and Starts to climb | I pray for courageIn the timeWhen suffering comes and Starts to climb |
| I pray for courageAt the endTo see death coming As a friend | I pray for courageAt the endTo see death coming As a friend |
| • The Flame is published by Canongate. | • The Flame is published by Canongate. |
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| Leonard Cohen | Leonard Cohen |
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