How sweet and precious that you can share the song and the interpretation of it with your son! Such deep connection you both share. Thanks for sharing the moment with us.
I find myself again and again drawn back to your Aug 4 post.
Yes, I had heard Leonard Cohen's Suzzane a few times in my life. With what you've shared, now I have a sense it will rise near to LC's Hallelujah (for the last 25 years I have had the great fortune to be a member of what we refer to as the Hallelujah Men's group).
Yes, with every passing day I more deeply respect and can attest to the bittersweet (yangyin, actioncontemplation, griefgrace) nature of reality.
Lastly, I would share that it was the Odilon Redon painting that seems to have struck a cord (not sure if it be a minor fall or major lift). The few times I have heard someone reference this biblical tale, every time I am sat up straight, baffled and alerted to the fearsome territory from which it arises. The attraction is strong, sometimes with a sense of too personally familiar. thus far I've ventured just a respectful glance in it's direction.
I sit here reading this as I prepare to take my mom to chemotherapy. This time with her is a gift. Five years ago I thought I may only have months left with her. There is no remission for this type of cancer. We are extremely close and she is the best mom, woman and friend. She is good and kind and generous with affection and love. Everyone who is special to her knows it. And knows the true feeling of being loved and cared about. She loves life and she doesn't shy away from the difficult topics. She never has. As a young girl in the 1950-60's she would call out bigotry and hate when she saw it. She recognized injustice as a small child and called it out, even when it got her in trouble. Because she knew then what was right. We are to love each other.
A higher consciousness opens us to a non-dualistic seeing of reality, in which terrific and horrific are one, like two sides of a coin. Deep pain or profound love is the catalyst for the transformative awakening, if we consent to walk into the river, holding the hands of someone or Someone, Suzanne or Jesus, touched by human kindness or divine redemption.
Susan, this so touching and beautiful. I forwarded it to all the closest people in my life. The depth in this post is so wonderful. And I do believe the reality of life is bittersweet. I’m ok with it as I think it allows me to appreciate the beauty of life even more.
I love this song! I used to play it all the time when I had a CD player in my car. 😁
I always wondered what the meaning of this song was and now it’s clearer. Thank you Susan for your interpretation. I once thought it was about transcendence into the after life.
OMG Susan! In tears reading "Suzanne"and the guidance you offer your son. Here's the thing: I heeded a reminder this morning to recalibrate my response in dealing with my day-to-day stress of confronting the dissonance we experience in our imperfect world on so many levels - and decided to take a short course with a very wise, no-frills meditation teacher and thinker. I say this because it's in my nature to seek my transcendent encounters through Art, through the cathartic release embedded in its power to capture heart-breaking beauty in the brokenness of our world and within each of us. But there's also the sustaining wisdom of touching our imperfect bodies with a whisper from our compassionate inner presence….”Bittersweet" was a powerful confirmation of how I understood myself. Your book infused the backbone of my expressive dance program Dancing with Joy & Sorrow, which I launched shortly after reading it.
Your writings and your caring approach to the Quiet Life community, etched in humility, have my abiding admiration and respect. Thank you!🌟🙏
I don’t know the song but I understand the sentiment. I lost my children eleven years ago in a painful divorce. Some days I wake up - like today - with the albatross of grief around my neck, weighed down by incredible sorrow. And each time it appears, I wonder, “Will I ever heal from this pain?” And then, I accept the bittersweet truth that grief and love must coexist. Would I trade grief for never having known what it is to love? I can’t imagine anything more truly bittersweet than loving, then losing, a child, to the ambiguity of alienation.
Once again, Susan, you tear open my heart! I have loved this song, Suzanne, since forever. Your interpretation is so clear and deep, and yes, it fits so well with your Bittersweet ("only drowning men [can] see him."). So now at your prompt, I've spent some time just contemplating the song. Suzanne is a song that sings itself on so many levels-- Suzanne herself, along with her husband, was a friend of Leonard Cohen, and lived in Montreal near the St. Lawrence River and the Basilica of Notre Dame ("our Lady of the Harbor"). Everything about her was half-crazy and exotic--even the mundane "tea and oranges" felt exotic, and erotic. Although he was sexually attracted to her ("her perfect body"), she was unavailable to him. But despite his lust or maybe because of it, Suzanne was a gateway to a deep creative unconscious, to soul, that recurrent archetype of water. (I feel like I, too, have had some great insights that started with the sensual, unattainable, and not-so-lofty parts of my life.) Anyway, his lust brought him to thinking about Jesus, who lived in that deep, like a sailor lives in the literal water. But although Jesus could walk on water, he could not walk on what "you" (i.e., Leonard Cohen himself) consider "wisdom". Ordinary "wisdom" lets Jesus sink like a rock! With depth, love, and yes great loss, Leonard sees (we see) the perfect beauty of life (our own "perfect body"). Our Suzannes are indeed ordinary people, dressed in Salvation Army rags (albeit with the quirky feathers of individuality), but that human connection, however it begins, if allowed to deepen, can show us the beauty of life, "amid the garbage and the flowers". It's everywhere, in the seaweed at the edges of the deep unconscious, and in the everyday. It's not limited to the church, but is even in the light ("[pouring] down like honey"). I think this is one of the most profound songs ever!
I always loved that song, but never stopped to analyze its meaning. Thank you for doing that! I’ve learned that it’s the broken heart that shows you the beauty and the magic that was always here. Just like Leonard said , it’s the cracks that let the light in (to paraphrase) .
I remember this song from college. I loved the poetry, the mystery, the paradox. 20 years later, after my children were in college, I went to graduate school. In a literature course this song was included among traditional famous poems. I was so surprised! I only thought of it as a beautiful song, yet it had been included in the official canon of great literature. Of course, I always wished that I could be Suzanne! What a beautiful interpretation you offered your son.
How sweet and precious that you can share the song and the interpretation of it with your son! Such deep connection you both share. Thanks for sharing the moment with us.
I find myself again and again drawn back to your Aug 4 post.
Yes, I had heard Leonard Cohen's Suzzane a few times in my life. With what you've shared, now I have a sense it will rise near to LC's Hallelujah (for the last 25 years I have had the great fortune to be a member of what we refer to as the Hallelujah Men's group).
Yes, with every passing day I more deeply respect and can attest to the bittersweet (yangyin, actioncontemplation, griefgrace) nature of reality.
Lastly, I would share that it was the Odilon Redon painting that seems to have struck a cord (not sure if it be a minor fall or major lift). The few times I have heard someone reference this biblical tale, every time I am sat up straight, baffled and alerted to the fearsome territory from which it arises. The attraction is strong, sometimes with a sense of too personally familiar. thus far I've ventured just a respectful glance in it's direction.
I sit here reading this as I prepare to take my mom to chemotherapy. This time with her is a gift. Five years ago I thought I may only have months left with her. There is no remission for this type of cancer. We are extremely close and she is the best mom, woman and friend. She is good and kind and generous with affection and love. Everyone who is special to her knows it. And knows the true feeling of being loved and cared about. She loves life and she doesn't shy away from the difficult topics. She never has. As a young girl in the 1950-60's she would call out bigotry and hate when she saw it. She recognized injustice as a small child and called it out, even when it got her in trouble. Because she knew then what was right. We are to love each other.
Very moving commentary ! There is so much pain and beauty in the world so your writing helps me process it.
A higher consciousness opens us to a non-dualistic seeing of reality, in which terrific and horrific are one, like two sides of a coin. Deep pain or profound love is the catalyst for the transformative awakening, if we consent to walk into the river, holding the hands of someone or Someone, Suzanne or Jesus, touched by human kindness or divine redemption.
Love this post and love this community. I have finally found my people. So much beauty and depth.
Susan, this so touching and beautiful. I forwarded it to all the closest people in my life. The depth in this post is so wonderful. And I do believe the reality of life is bittersweet. I’m ok with it as I think it allows me to appreciate the beauty of life even more.
I love this song! I used to play it all the time when I had a CD player in my car. 😁
I always wondered what the meaning of this song was and now it’s clearer. Thank you Susan for your interpretation. I once thought it was about transcendence into the after life.
OMG Susan! In tears reading "Suzanne"and the guidance you offer your son. Here's the thing: I heeded a reminder this morning to recalibrate my response in dealing with my day-to-day stress of confronting the dissonance we experience in our imperfect world on so many levels - and decided to take a short course with a very wise, no-frills meditation teacher and thinker. I say this because it's in my nature to seek my transcendent encounters through Art, through the cathartic release embedded in its power to capture heart-breaking beauty in the brokenness of our world and within each of us. But there's also the sustaining wisdom of touching our imperfect bodies with a whisper from our compassionate inner presence….”Bittersweet" was a powerful confirmation of how I understood myself. Your book infused the backbone of my expressive dance program Dancing with Joy & Sorrow, which I launched shortly after reading it.
Your writings and your caring approach to the Quiet Life community, etched in humility, have my abiding admiration and respect. Thank you!🌟🙏
I don’t know the song but I understand the sentiment. I lost my children eleven years ago in a painful divorce. Some days I wake up - like today - with the albatross of grief around my neck, weighed down by incredible sorrow. And each time it appears, I wonder, “Will I ever heal from this pain?” And then, I accept the bittersweet truth that grief and love must coexist. Would I trade grief for never having known what it is to love? I can’t imagine anything more truly bittersweet than loving, then losing, a child, to the ambiguity of alienation.
Dear David, I'm so so sorry - such a grief.
And yes, to accepting the bittersweet truth of grief and love.
Here is an epigraph at the beginning of a book called “Frankie” by Graham Norton that I just started reading. Another confirmation of Bittersweet.
Life . . . [is] a lament in one ear, maybe, but always a song in the other. Seán O’Casey
what a fantastic way to express the bittersweet!!
Once again, Susan, you tear open my heart! I have loved this song, Suzanne, since forever. Your interpretation is so clear and deep, and yes, it fits so well with your Bittersweet ("only drowning men [can] see him."). So now at your prompt, I've spent some time just contemplating the song. Suzanne is a song that sings itself on so many levels-- Suzanne herself, along with her husband, was a friend of Leonard Cohen, and lived in Montreal near the St. Lawrence River and the Basilica of Notre Dame ("our Lady of the Harbor"). Everything about her was half-crazy and exotic--even the mundane "tea and oranges" felt exotic, and erotic. Although he was sexually attracted to her ("her perfect body"), she was unavailable to him. But despite his lust or maybe because of it, Suzanne was a gateway to a deep creative unconscious, to soul, that recurrent archetype of water. (I feel like I, too, have had some great insights that started with the sensual, unattainable, and not-so-lofty parts of my life.) Anyway, his lust brought him to thinking about Jesus, who lived in that deep, like a sailor lives in the literal water. But although Jesus could walk on water, he could not walk on what "you" (i.e., Leonard Cohen himself) consider "wisdom". Ordinary "wisdom" lets Jesus sink like a rock! With depth, love, and yes great loss, Leonard sees (we see) the perfect beauty of life (our own "perfect body"). Our Suzannes are indeed ordinary people, dressed in Salvation Army rags (albeit with the quirky feathers of individuality), but that human connection, however it begins, if allowed to deepen, can show us the beauty of life, "amid the garbage and the flowers". It's everywhere, in the seaweed at the edges of the deep unconscious, and in the everyday. It's not limited to the church, but is even in the light ("[pouring] down like honey"). I think this is one of the most profound songs ever!
I love your interpretations, Michele - thank you!
What a beautiful post. I do certainly agree that reality is bitter sweet. Thank you for sharing this
you're welcome, Inma.
I always loved that song, but never stopped to analyze its meaning. Thank you for doing that! I’ve learned that it’s the broken heart that shows you the beauty and the magic that was always here. Just like Leonard said , it’s the cracks that let the light in (to paraphrase) .
I remember this song from college. I loved the poetry, the mystery, the paradox. 20 years later, after my children were in college, I went to graduate school. In a literature course this song was included among traditional famous poems. I was so surprised! I only thought of it as a beautiful song, yet it had been included in the official canon of great literature. Of course, I always wished that I could be Suzanne! What a beautiful interpretation you offered your son.
Thank you. Words and images to ponder with prayer. Wondering....could Suzanne represent or perhaps be Wisdom? Blessings