I wrote some initial thoughts about Leonard Cohen in my post for “Suzanne,” and don’t really need to expand on them, but what the hell…

The short version is, I’m at best agnostic about most of the hallowed singer-songwriters of the 1960s and ’70s. I have nothing against them; I just didn’t listen to much of that music, so have no opinions about them. Cohen is a bit different because my friend and mentor, Dave Van Ronk, liked him and thought he was a good poet, and recorded a nice version of “Bird on a Wire…” which I learned and actually made into one of my showpieces back when I was 17 and full of nostalgie de la boue (a term I learned from Dave).

And, as I wrote before, I often was called upon to sing “Suzanne” when I was around French people (especially female French people). So I was somewhat interested in him, and read Beautiful Losers (about which I remember nothing) and some of his poetry (about which I remember less). And I read a few interviews, and sometimes found them interesting, and sometimes annoying…. bit too much the sensitive, tortured, handsome poet-man for my taste.

But I always thought “Sisters of Mercy” was a terrific song. Beautiful, evocative lyrics perfectly matched with a lovely melody. I’ve known it for over fifty years and still find new resonances in it. And that’s before mentioning the scene in McCabe and Mrs. Miller, with the prostitutes trekking through the Alaskan wilderness as this song plays in the background. Ever since I saw that for the first time –and I’ve seen it multiple times since — a picture of that scene goes through my head when I sing this. All in all, it’s a deep and lovely piece of work. For me, it’s his masterpiece.

All of which said… Van Ronk always said that Cohen and Mitchell were more careful writers than Dylan — not more brilliant, but more willing to go back and work on their songs, and fix the lines that needed fixing. He thought Dylan was a genius, but, for example, “All Along the Watchtower” — he would point out that a watchtower isn’t a wall, it’s a tower, and you can’t go “along” it. In which spirit…

“They are not departed or gone…”? It scans nicely, but if they are departed they are gone, and if they are gone they are departed. There’s no “or” about it; it’s just repetitive. Albeit lovely. Poetic license, and all that. Best not to think too much.

(Oh, yes, and… I just went back to get a photo from that scene in McCabe and Mrs. Miller, and find that it doesn’t look the way I remember it, and “Sisters of Mercy” is in a different part of the film. And it’s not set in Alaska, it’s in Washington state, though filmed in British Columbia. But I still see that scene in my head when I sing.)

(And… my rule for this project is that I do all the songs from memory — that’s the point; they are the songs in my head — and don’t check them before filming, and when I checked afterwards, I found that the lyric should be “they touched both my eyes…” not “both my hands.” It’s definitely better that way. He’s a poet; I’m not. Sorry.)