There was a bittersweet serendipity to arranging »Nightingale«. The lyrics really struck my heart, because Carl [Anderson] was such an incredible vocalist. Luckily, I heard the melody as I read the lyric and I just had to write it down for the band. Leonard had the idea for an acapella intro and a guitar part that was really sweet. He sat with the original track for a few months, experimenting with different vocal ideas before he hit upon the octave bass and tenor parts.

I never lost any close friends before Carl. We spoke several times while he was hospitalized, and even though I knew the prognosis was bad, I still wasn’t prepared for the final outcome. Unless you saw Carl perform live, there’s no way to comprehend the depth of his talent. He was a dear friend and I really wanted to do something beautiful for him. There was some question as to whether Nightingale would be on the record, because it’s in the key of B, nowhere near Leonard’s usual range. But when I rerecorded it lower, it just didn’t sound as bright or right. So Leonard felt bound to use my original version, and I don’t think he’s sung that high since the eighties! I give him credit for stepping out of his vocal comfort zone and not giving up on the song. And I really applaud him for nailing two tracks an octave apart…a feat for any singer.

On February 23, 2004, Carl [Anderson] died of leukemia, four days shy of his 59th birthday. I happened to be working with Leonard when I heard the news. I was in such shock I couldn't speak. Leonard left the room and returned ten minutes later with a piece of paper in his hand. »I thought this might help you,« he said quietly. It was an old sheet of vellum with a few typewritten stanzas on it – obviously something he'd written twenty or thirty years ago. It was titled, »Nightingale« and I was moved to tears by the verses. The melody came to me as I reread the lyric two days later. It's about a nightingale's song that is so pure and beautiful, it brings love and meaning to life. I was deeply moved when Leonard suggested we dedicate »Nightingale« in memory of Carl.

In this song Cohen goes back to the Romantic ideals of Keats – as earlier of Byron – evoking Keats' »Nightingale« but reversing the sad tale whereby the narrator ends up a »sod« by having the nightingale move to a new realm singing »somewhere.« This is that »holy place« that no matter what your creed, one believes that Carl Anderson consecrates with his sacred voice.

Ode to a Nightingale
by John Keats (1795-1821)

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
    My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
    One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
    But being too happy in thine happiness,--
        That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees
            In some melodious plot
    Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
        Singest of summer in full-throated ease.
 
O, for a draught of vintage! that hath been
    Cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
    Dance, and Provencal song, and sunburnt mirth!
O for a beaker full of the warm South,
    Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
        With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
            And purple-stained mouth;
    That I might drink, and leave the world unseen,
        And with thee fade away into the forest dim:
 
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
    What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
    Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs,
    Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;
        Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
            And leaden-eyed despairs,
    Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
        Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.
 
Away! away! for I will fly to thee,
    Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards,
But on the viewless wings of Poesy,
    Though the dull brain perplexes and retards:
Already with thee! tender is the night,
    And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne,
        Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays;
            But here there is no light,
    Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown
        Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways.
 
I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
    Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
    Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;
    White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
        Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves;
            And mid-May's eldest child,
    The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
        The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.
 
Darkling I listen; and, for many a time
    I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme,
    To take into the air my quiet breath;
Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
    To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
        While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
            In such an ecstasy!
    Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain ---
        To thy high requiem become a sod.
 
Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
    No hungry generations tread thee down;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
    In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
    Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
        She stood in tears amid the alien corn;
            The same that oft-times hath
    Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam
        Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.
 
Forlorn! the very word is like a bell
    To toll me back from thee to my sole self!
Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well
    As she is fam'd to do, deceiving elf.
Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades
    Past the near meadows, over the still stream,
        Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep
            In the next valley-glades:
    Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
        Fled is that music --- Do I wake or sleep?

Leonard once signed a letter to Jack McClelland, »Goodbye, forever/Leonard Cohen/The Jewish Keats« so we know that Leonard is certainly familiar with John Keats and most certainly one of his most famous poems, »Ode To A Nightingale«. But before we do a brief comparison, I think that it might be helpful to look to some of the conventions of Romantic Poetry as I think that many elements in Leonard's songs and poems continue this tradition. One of the chief characteristics of Romantic Poetry is the existence of differing realms-a notion that goes back to at least as far as Plato. Of course, the Judeo-Christian tradition has its own realms of Heaven, Earth, Hell etc., but, to the Romantics like Byron, Keats and Shelley-the realms were more rooted in Greek and Roman myth. There is also the difference between the »seen« and the »unseen« also sharing poetic tradition with many genres. Within these realms there is movement. There are themes of ascent and themes of descent. If you notice, Dear Heather uses many of these ascent/descent themes in several songs.
One of the Romantic Poetry conventions is the ability of the narrative poet to transcend these realms and move from the »seen« world to the »unseen.« Often it is special conditions like moonlight or casements that allow for this glimpse into another realm. I think it is important to note that this realm is a »higher« realm where truth and beauty reside.
The narrator in Keats' »Ode« is wrestling with the problem of mortality. Having been given a glimpse of the immortal through this very uncommon bird, whose songs in ancient days were heard by »emperor and clown«, the poet descends back into the mortal world where his body will become a »sod«. Can there be a more bleak rendering of oblivion?
The whole passage is worth quoting here:

Darkling I listen; and, for many a time
   I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme,
   To take into the air my quiet breath;
       Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
   To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
       While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad
           In such an ecstasy!
   Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain—
         To thy high requiem become a sod.
 Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!

I think the important difference between Keats' version and Leonard's is the direction of the movement:

Though you are singing somewhere still, I can no longer hear you.

Although this can be argued, it seems that in this case, the nightingale has ascended to that higher realm leaving the poet back here in the mortal realm with, at least, the chance that someday he will follow. It has also been turned into a song and that, of course, allows for the influence of music. It is like the difference between reading Shakespeare and seeing it performed on stage where the dramatic action and the movement between realms can be visualized. Shakespeare often would indicate the change in realm by moving the action to the woods (generally when staged this would be at a higher level than the action taking place in the town). Music, too, can alter this state by changing from a minor to a major mode or by increasing the tempo. Leonard once spoke of »Here It Is«, by observing, yes, it is a song about death but I've given it this jaunty little melody.
I think, as has already been spoken, that the poem given to Anjani [Thomas] was in this spirit of consolation and points to the possibility of ascending to that higher level whatever it is. And, perhaps, like the poet we've all been given little glimpses of it at times-and it is sweet and it is good.

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