That glorious ruined face
that voice
I cry each time
because it hurts me
deep in my chest
and the grief of knowing
that this was the song
that said goodbye
hurts more than you know
hurts more than I admit
and he brought himself
to this music
always always always
he gave us
something of himself
and then I remember, always
always,
that you were the one who left
one bright day
with the sun before you
and you asked for water
and nobody could give you
just a sip of water
for your poor dry mouth
just a taste of water
to drift away on
and you left it playing
in your room
and everyone you love
couldn’t save you
couldn’t keep you
and I wsh
you could have had
that one sip
of cool water
This song always makes me cry. I’m crying now. And it reminds me of a friend of ours who died too young. It’s for dVerse.
So much sorrow when a song reminds us of such a devastating moment… the focus on being left without water makes me think of sorrow so deep you cannot cry.
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I don’t think I can cope with too many sad songs tonight.
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Oh Sarah, if only they knew how deep the knife cuts when they go like this. It leaves behind a pain that is relived over and over.
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It’s amazing how a song can reach so deeply inside your soul and wrench it. Sometimes it takes a whole song and sometimes all it takes are the opening bars. Goodbye songs hurt the most. Your poem made me cry, Sarah, because it reminded me of the last time I saw my mum. Somebody at the home had brought her water but they left it on the windowsill.
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Oh, Kim, I’m so sorry. Those little things stay with you.
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Very nice song. The title of your poem and the line “empire of dirt” stands out in “Hurt”.
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Such a simple thing, a sip of water. It’s the final, most basic necessity. The leveller.
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Tender besutiful memories you express her Sarah, and a very sad song.
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A perfect illustration for the prompt. Johnny Cash could strum the heart strings; nicely done.
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Hmm. Sad… and Johnny Cash had a way to make one really feel sorrow…
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Wow, so we’ll done, Sarah. For me, when Cash sings, “…my sweetest friend…” that is what makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand. You effectively complement the song with your entire poem but especially with the build up to no one being able to give that water, and the resolution of your solo wish that ‘you’ could have just had one sip. Beautiful.
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Johnny Cash is a musical icon whose passing brings sorrow to so many. He left us the beautiful gift of his music and for that I am thankful. He is one of the greats of all time in his field.
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When my 44-year-old brother died suddenly back in ’08, I flew out to Portland to retrieve his effects. I retrieved his laptop and found on his iTunes that the morning of his fatal heart attack he had been listening to a Pat Matheny tune that had so enveloped my own grief many years before. We cried the same river yet never spoke of it to each other. This poem and the Cash song makes me so think of his apartment on a cold rainy spring morning two days after he died. Full of everything he was and him never again to be found. Empire of dirt indeed.
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As much as I love this song, it is so painful to hear. Associating it with a particular moment, as you do, must be just as much so.
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I find this song both gutsy and harrowing, powerful emotions. But your words really moved my heart.
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Johnny Cash knew life in all its aspects, and this song encompasses the many leavetakings that we all face. If…that word hangs everywhere. And the image of water in your poem reflects that thirst that sometimes can’t ever be satisfied. (K)
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The repetition here is very powerful….the thirst so meaningful in a number of ways. Losing someone too young…..it’s what I just wrote about as well. It never leaves you….that kind of loss. You may not feel it as often…but it is always there, simmering….until a memory brings it to the fore. For me, a song….for you as well it seems.
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This is a powerful choice Sarah. I also love the original version done by Nine Inch Nails, but Cash brings such soul and originality to this it is improbable to think of it as a “cover.” I also find human resolve and power in this, the lines “I would keep myself, I would find a way.” have been an important nexus for me to try to express my life and become who I am. The small basic comforts are not small when you can’t have them, your poem ties us all in empathy, and unity, like Jane said, a leveler, very sad, very desperate.
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