1

You know the song, right?

If you don’t, here it is. You’re welcome. You can play it in the background while you read the rest.

2

I’m cracked open. This can be a good feeling. It’s not a good one today. I feel — well, I already named it. Cracked open.

No, I don’t like it.

But I’ll probably do it again. At least occasionally. I have done so, intermittently, for years.

Leonard Cohen would understand.

3

In case you chose not to play the video or listen to the music, this is the relevant lyric:

There is a crack, a crack in everything

That’s how the light gets in

4

The crack is vertical rather than horizontal. It runs deep, this chasm. Deep and narrow. I always appreciate its narrowness. It means that I can cover the opening relatively easily.

I tend to forget about the depth. Impossible to fill. And this sucks.

On the plus side… it’s so deep, I rarely reach the bottom.

5

The light is supposed to heal. Before it heals though, it illuminates. 

Some things should really stay in the dark.

Her: We’re doing this today?

Me: You know it’s actually more effective than therapy.

6

I’m not going to tell you what lives in my dark. This is why we invented poetry and storytelling, after all. To hide truth in metaphor.

(Actually, we first invented poetry as a mnemonic aide. But nobody wants to hear that story any more than they want to hear that writing was invented by accountants.)

And also, it doesn’t matter — what caused the crack, what lives in the crack. None of that matters.

The only thing that matters is how you re-cover it.

Me: See what I did there?

Her: It’s not clever if you have to point out how clever it is.

Me: Remind me, why do I let you live in my head?

7

I prefer to keep the crack covered and mended. But. I’ll grant you that every once in a while, the wound needs air and light.

And it’s better if you choose the time, place and method of exposing it.

But sometimes, accidents happen.

So. Here I am, cracked open. Feeling things and not fighting them very much. Nor thinking about them either. Just feeling. Being.

It will be over soon. Everything passes. Especially self-awareness.

8

Her: So many dreary self-indulgent thoughts. Can we move on, please?

Me: Yeah. Lets.

9

I never got to see Leonard Cohen live. True story — when he died, on November 7, 2016, he was, what, 80? 82? He was the first and only “celebrity” whose death I mourned. Chiefly because — true story — there ended any chance of me ever fucking Leonard Cohen. Or giving him head on an unmade bed… but that’s another song…

I fully realize the futility and foolishness of this idea. But see, while he was alive, there was a non-zero chance that it could happen. Right?

Death, well, that was the end of that fantasy.

Side note: Did not even realize I harboured this fantasy until the poet died.

Another side note, but totally on topic: Exceptional poets make fantastic lovers. Because to really get metaphor you have to be thoroughly grounded in reality.

10

He promised me the crack’s where the light gets in. And he was right. I guess.

But sometimes, the immediately correct choice is to keep the light out.

Yours in metaphor,

“Jane”