Hunting for a poem by leonard Cohen

[hiten900]

Hello,
I'm 56 years old and when I was 20, I started reading and listning to Leonard Cohen. Once upon a time I owned a book of poems written by Leonard Cohen, and one particular poem sticks in my mind. I'm trying to find it and have not been successful. Any help in identifying it will be very appreciated.

The poem is a short one - could not be more than 15 lines. The poem talks about a person who is going away and the thought that one did not made an effort to meet as there was always a possibility to do when ever one choose to so do. But now that the person is going away, the opportunity to meet is lost and the poet is sad because of the loss.

This poem haunts me as I often think of it when I did not meet/interact with people and now I can't do so, as the person has moved away. Also, in my mind the image of a rose and sunrise appears when I think of the poem. I'm not sure of the context, but that's the image in my mind - rose, sunrise, sadness.

Thanks.
Hiten

[kalinowt]

Hi Hiten,

There are alot of Cohen poems which have elements of what you are looking for in them. Do you happen to remember which book of poetry it was you owned? I own Stranger Music, published in 1993 which has most of Leonard's published songs and poems up until that time in it. If you could narrow it down for us, I'm sure one of our regular forum poetry contributers could run it down for you.

Kalinowt

Hello,
I'm 56 years old and when I was 20, I started reading and listning to Leonard Cohen. Once upon a time I owned a book of poems written by Leonard Cohen, and one particular poem sticks in my mind. I'm trying to find it and have not been successful. Any help in identifying it will be very appreciated.

The poem is a short one - could not be more than 15 lines. The poem talks about a person who is going away and the thought that one did not made an effort to meet as there was always a possibility to do when ever one choose to so do. But now that the person is going away, the opportunity to meet is lost and the poet is sad because of the loss.

This poem haunts me as I often think of it when I did not meet/interact with people and now I can't do so, as the person has moved away. Also, in my mind the image of a rose and sunrise appears when I think of the poem. I'm not sure of the context, but that's the image in my mind - rose, sunrise, sadness.

Thanks.
Hiten

[hiten900]

Thanks for your suggestion. I do not remember the book, but I certainly read it in the 1979 time frame.

Hiten

[LisaLCFan]

Hi Hiten,

This is a great opportunity for you to rediscover Leonard Cohen's poetry! Why don't you go online, buy his poetry books, and when they arrive, you can read them and find the poem you seek! You will doubtlessly find many more poems to love!

To narrow down your search, since you read the book you mentioned around 1979, it could be Death of a Lady's Man, which came out around then. You may want to start with that one (it was re-issued last year, so it will not be difficult to find a copy online).

Good luck!

[kalinowt]

Hi Hiten,

As I was looking through my volume of Stranger Music the other day to see if I could fulfill your request, I sort of looked at about 10 different poems through Leonard Cohen's half dozen volumes of poetry written up until the 1970s that kind of fit your description. One of those poems was from Death of a Ladies Man. It is called "Angelica". But just because you read it in 1979 doesn't mean the poem you vaguely remember comes from Death of a Ladies Man though.

Angelica stands by the sea
Anything I say is too loud for her mood
I will have to come back
a million years later
with scalp of my old life
hanging from one hand

Thanks for your suggestion. I do not remember the book, but I certainly read it in the 1979 time frame.

Hiten

[hiten900]

Thanks for the help, I guess I will just have to buy a few books and check them out.