Ring the Bells That Still Can Ring (Cohen)

The bells are saying this is humanity. Maybe not the actual bells but the invention and the hands, the arms, the mind and the heart that feel compelled to ring. It has its own language.

You can ring a bell when your loved ones get married because you feel joy that they have chosen a partner.

Or you can ring a bell to alert your tribe to oncoming danger.

Or you can ring about your breaking heart, or despair, or grief.

Or you can ring about justice because you know that justice is right. Or injustice when you know that injustice is wrong.

Or gratitude, because if you are not grateful for anything in your life, then you know your life is broken, and the pain is too much to bear alone. And if that is the case then you can ring about pain.

You don't actually need a bell to do any of this - you can simply speak the words to whomever is close by. How they respond is not your fault and you are not obliged to change them. You have a stake in this moment, but your are not in charge of it.

You are not just a dancing statue on a cathedral in a town square, turning unconsciously from the gears below. You are an organic spirit.

If there were no bells or songs or shouts we would be no more than numbers on a spread sheet, and after we die we will have no voice beyond the memories of those we leave behind.

"Ring the bells that still can ring" is from Leonard Cohen's song Anthem

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