Meta Comment

I believe that you heard your master sing

when I was sick in bed.

I suppose that he told you everything

that I keep locked away in my head.

Your master took you travelling,

well at least that’s what you said.

And now do you come back to bring

your prisoner wine and bread?

You met him at some temple, where

they take your clothes at the door.

He was just a numberless man in a chair

who’d just come back from the war.

And you wrap up his tired face in your hair

and he hands you the apple core.

Then he touches your lips now so suddenly bare

of all the kisses we put on some time before.

And he gave you a German Shepherd to walk

with a collar of leather and nails,

and he never once made you explain or talk

about all of the little details,

such as who had a worm and who had a rock,

and who had you through the mails.

Now your love is a secret all over the block,

and it never stops not even when your master fails.

And he took you up in his aeroplane,

which he flew without any hands,

and you cruised above the ribbons of rain

that drove the crowd from the stands.

Then he killed the lights in a lonely Lane

and, an ape with angel glands,

erased the final wisps of pain

with the music of rubber bands.

And now I hear your master sing,

you kneel for him to come.

His body is a golden string

that your body is hanging from.

His body is a golden string,

my body has grow’en numb.

Oh now you hear your master sing,

your shirt is all undone.

And will you kneel beside this bed

that we polished so long ago,

before your master chose instead

to make my bed of snow?

Your eyes are wild and your knuckles are red

and you’re speaking far too low.

No I can’t make out what your master said

before he made you go.

Then I think you’re playing far too rough

for a lady who’s been to the moon;

I’ve lain by this window long enough

you get used to an empty room.

And your love is some dust in an old man’s cuff

who is tapping his foot to a tune,

and your thighs are a ruin, you want too much,

let’s say you came back some time too soon.

I loved your master perfectly

I taught him all that he knew.

He was starving in some deep mystery

like a man who is sure what is true.

And I sent you to him with my guarantee

I could teach him something new,

and I taught him how you would long for me

no matter what he said no matter what you’d do.

I believe that you heard your master sing

while I was sick in bed,

I’m sure that he told you everything

I must keep locked away in my head.

Your master took you travelling,

well at least that’s what you said,

And now do you come back to bring

your prisoner wine and bread?

-”Master Song” from Songs of Leonard Cohen