How The Light Gets In

The story of civilization on this planet is held in Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem”. 

How can I contribute to my society so it sustains and avoids the entropy of corruption, pollution, death and despair?

Cohen's song inspires me. I see our history on this planet as a cautionary tale of cycles, problem solving, good intentions and unintended consequences.

The first stanza of Anthem announces the birds sing at the break of day.  This tells me that I need not look to our human history alone. I can find wisdom and inspiration in all living things. If the birds start the day by singing then I can do something every day. Music is like a prayer urging me to go on, not give up.

Those "little things with feathers” that Emily Dickenson called hope, were taken for granted by us, until Rachel Carson warned of a silent spring. DNT was killing so much of the natural world many of us didn’t notice until Carson pointed it out. It inspired the environmental movement to pressure the monolith of “the economy” to find a way without DNT. It did and “hope" returned in many places.

I am advised not to dwell on the past or “what is yet to be”. Just because an avarice in our human nature is driving our planet to crisis while the innocent "holy dove" is sold and caught and sold again, it doesn't blot out all hope for the future.  Who is the holy dove and who is catching, buying and selling again? What is it that traps her? Is it our need to believe we can own peace and freedom forever? Is it spite? Or is it the will to power?

Humanity invented the market and those who prospered are now enslaved by it. How can I rise above it, change it, make it sustainable?

And what if it isn’t just an economic system? What if its a self interest so deep it only shows when the opportunity arises? What if I am so effectively conditioned to feel powerless that I cannot move forward or know what to do?

The song itself doesn’t get too stuck in the preaching: “Ring the bells that still can ring / forget your perfect offering”. After all I am not the conductor or composer but I am in the orchestra. My agency and problem solving skills are all I have but they come when something cracks and a sliver of light gets in.

It’s easy to fear the light I don’t possess, easy to let conspiracy theories discourage me. This is one of my tragic flaws. To feel incapable of reading the world and responding to it is natural, but only corruption benefits by my fear of being engaged.

If my society descends into fascism and hate, is my birth as a person with imagination and creative problem solving skills betrayed? If a social contract is harnessed beneath rules instead of love is that a “marriage spent” ? And is “the widowhood of every government” a reference to the lack of leadership, the abdication of responsible husbandry when profit is the only motivator?

Who can have faith in a lawless crowd? Injustice, racism, misogyny and greed does not offer a future. Violence has “summoned up a thunder cloud” and the killers need to hear from Leonard and the rest of us. What perfect offering could I ever possess that is more urgent than ringing the bell when the planet we depend on cracks under the weight of our wars and greed?

It is the deepest most difficult questions that let the light in even if my ego does not come out looking pretty.

(You can find the lyrics to Anthem here Leonard Cohen Anthem lyrics)

Song of Light (glosa on Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah

I’ve heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don’t really care for music, do you?
It goes like this

“Hallelujah,” Leonard Cohen 

If lust in moonlight defies the laws of day
look again for another clue, the King
or Satan but not the youthful body made
to incubate the seed and turn it into
another King. Love is the bringer of life
and the question lies in the way we award
each birth its sacred crown, its milk
and meat, its breath and water
required to live. What can we afford?
I’ve heard there was a secret chord.

Went bathing too in someone’s pool
in a pink bikini, new, and pale as innocence,
with a giggle of girls unaware
of longing, we shivered out of water
to hug the man who wrapped his towel
around us, his smile was warm and broad
ubiquitous as the sun and the skin’s pleasure
to tender and warm the pumping heart
sweet melodies come to fate’s sharp sword
that David played, and it pleased the Lord.


But is that nature’s fault or our weak link
in organizing wars and tribal laws
we plunge into control, the hardware
of our thoughts, forgetting the power
and urgency of that which we can’t prove
or fix with science, or muddle through
the built in failure to close the womb
to see at last that pleasure is the gift
we crave, the ocean wave the loyal blue.
But you don’t really care for music, do you?


Ecclesiastes’ song of sighs like time alone
pulls the tide, and moon on water
softly bathes the night in soothing rhythm.
After bloodshed takes its toll, our purpose
under heaven rocks the crib to climax gentle
pleasures shooting stars to simple bliss.
Then fearful minds begin their work
to legislate possession of the universal seed
and make desire a trap, a prison, forbidden kiss.
It goes like this.

All Souls Unitarian Church Solidarity Sing - Washington, DC

That's how the light gets in (Cohen)

These four lines have swirled in my head ever since Leonard Cohen died. I am in awe of these simple words and their depth. How each line works by itself and deepens by the presence of what comes before and what after.

Where does that wisdom come from? A crack in our genes? A mystery in the education? The back drop of a civilization where intelligence is shared through public education? Those who see the light creeping through the cracks?

The English speaking world is vast - there are billions who speak this language and yet some of our political stories get more stupid with each decade.

Media had to undergo a lobotomy in unison to fit the expanding fists of the bullies. Media outlets cannot make a profit. Workers cannot earn enough to build the economy with the things they need let alone the things they would wish for. And we are being told that those who are to blame are those who are tied up and whipped again.

Where will we go from here? Breaking apart what does not reveal the light? It's the cracks we should be looking for now because the structures have shut out the light.

The line in the title comes from Leonard Cohen's Anthem

Forget your perfect offering (Cohen)

Perfection is a wonderful idea, but we should not strive to be perfect.

Perfection is a social construct. Sometimes we forget to be perfect and we forget we are not perfect. It is a fantasy created to keep us striving.

But it is more often used to make others feel that they have failed. How can a mother be perfect? How can a figure be perfect?

Perfection comes in a bottle, in gift wrap, in a shop window, in a 30 second commercial. It's something beyond our reach but almost attainable. It's a cloud, a drug, an argument, a hummingbird.

Perfection is the trickster laughing at you when you look in the mirror.

Perfection will keep your self-esteem in check. It will nag you with all your failings when you try to sleep at night.

Perfection is a trap.

"Forget your perfect offering" a line from Anthem by Leonard Cohen

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

The Light

Ring the bells that still can ring

Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.

Leonard Cohen, Anthem