Love Songs

Reflections of a Numinous Presence Romance & Beauty

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    icon Feb 10, 2011
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I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or an arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadows and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
But carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
Thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
Risen from the earth, lives darkly in your body

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
So I love you because I know no other way
Than this; where I does not exist, nor you
So close that you hand on my chest is my hand
So close that your eyes close as I fall asleep

-Pablo Neruda

Neruda captures the spirit of deep dreamy love in the above Sonnet. He wrote it for his wife but the sentiment is universal and the feeling pure even holy. It is the type of love that intuits the innate loveliness in all human beings. 

Songs of love can touch our very soul and captivate our hearts, minds and bodies. Music’s almost mystical power takes to another place. It moves us like a Jungian dance as the dancer goes deep inside herself, the heart pours out love and the mind creates a space of safety. In “Home of the Gentry” by Ivan Turgenev, the protagonist is touched deeply by a piece of music played on a piano. A passage describes its almost mystical power:

“The sweet passionate melody captivated my heart from the first note; it was full of radiance, full of the tender throbbing of inspiration and beauty, continually growing and melting away; it rumored of everything on earth that is dear and secret and sacred to mankind; it breathed of immortal sadness and it departed from the earth to die in the heavens.”

Music’s power cannot be objectified nor studied under a microscope. Its ability to evoke or manipulate emotions is almost inexplicable yet its influence on our feelings is universal. The emotional content of music is quite subjective; it may be emotionally powerful yet it may be experienced in different ways by the people who hear it.  Still a love for music is a universal component of our culture and it appears to have importance in an evolutionary sense. It is theorized that music predates language.

Music is an apotheosis, a glorification of human life and the highest order of pure emotional expression along with the written word, oral history, poetry, painting and sculpture. I love all forms music and one of my favorite forms is the love song.

There must be reason for the enduring popularity of love songs. It could be the love song represents an intrinsic biological task to merge with others; and by merging, ensure the survival of our species - or maybe it fills our senses and lifts our spirits in an imperfect world. Cloe Madanes once said that the perspective of a thoughtful and intelligent person is melancholia. Makes sense to me. Love songs often carry that type of dialectic of opposing forces - oneness is bliss; separation is dangerous.

Here is a non-definitive list of my favorite love songs. Remember…One of the most soulful and timeless Beatle love songs is In My Life. The lyrics bear repeating. John Lennon sings: “ There are places I remember all my life though some have changed / Some forever not for better some have gone and some remain / All these places have their moments / With Lovers and Friends I still recall / Some are dead and some are living / In My Life I’ve loved them all
/ But of all these friends and lovers / There is no one compares with you / And these memories lose their meaning / When I think of love as something new / Though I know I’ll never lose affection / For people and things that went before / I know I’ll often stop and think about them / In my life I love you more.”

Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys created a masterpiece in 1966 when he penned God Only Knows with guest lyricist Tony Asher. The music is lush yet understated. The complicated melodic structure and harmonics perfectly underscore the message of a deeply felt love. Wilson utilized a harpsichord and French horns on the song, instruments not typically associated with a rock & roll band. He was only 23 years old at the time: “I may not always love you / But as long as there are skies above you / You never need to doubt it  / I’ll make you so sure about it / God only knows what I’d be without you.”

The Association is a great vocal band from the sixties/seventies.  Remember for a moment Never My Love: “You ask me if my love would change and I won’t require you / Never My Love / Never My Love / How can you think love will change when I’m asking to spend my whole life…With You”

Everything that Touches You goes a little bit deeper: “In my most secure moments I still can’t believe / That I’m spending those moments with you / And the ground I am walking and the air that I breathe  / Are shared in those moments with you / You love for real / You show the feel / For everything that touches you.”

Cole Porter wrote sophisticated jazzed up love songs such as I Get a Kick Out of You. It was featured in the Broadway musical Anything Goes but the definitive “hip” reading came from Frank Sinatra: “I get no kick in a plane / Flying too high with some guy in the sky / Is my idea of nothing to do  / But I get a kick out of you / Some get a kick from cocaine / I’m sure that if I took even one sniff / That would bore me terrifically, too / Yet, I get a kick out of you.”

One of my favorite obscure love songs is Can’t Find the Time to Tell You by Orpheus. It has a beautiful melody and sung in a clear baritone: Ba da da da da da / I Can’t Find the Time To Tell You / I look at your pretty face / And I fall in love with you  / every time I see you, yeah / Nightgowns of regal lace / That are flowin’ to the ground / Flowin’ to the ground in a mist around you.”  OK – you had to be there,

Ray Davies wrote the definitive rock & roll love song in 1968 with his band the Kinks, Waterloo Sunset has a beautiful cascading sound and lyrics filled with longing and loneliness. Davies is experiencing love and contentment through watching two lovers escape from Waterloo to the other side of the River Thames : Dirty old river, must you keep rolling / Flowing into the night / People so busy, make me feel dizzy / Taxi light shines so bright / But I don't feel afraid
As long as I gaze at / Waterloo sunset / I am in Paradise

Evanescence “My Immortal” is a triumph, a song of incredible depth and power about love, pain and loss: “I’m so tired of being here / Because your presence still lingers here / And it won’t leave me alone / These wounds won’t seem to heal / The pain is just too real / There is just too much that time cannot erase / I have tried hard to tell myself that you are gone  / But though you are still with me.”

The Proclaimers wrote a different kind of love song. Some may not view it as such but I do. For my wife and I, it’s “OUR SONG”. I dig the incessant beat and irreverent lyrics - it is simply irresistible. Here’s a sample lyric: “And I would walk 500 hundred miles / And I would walk 500 hundred more / Just to be the man who walks a thousand miles / To fall down at your door / When I’m lonely, well I know I’m gonna be / I’m gonna be the man who’s lonely without you / And when I’m dreaming, well you know I’m gonna dream / I’m gonna dream about the time I’m with you.”


The most tender love song I’ve ever heard is the quirky For Emily Wherever I May Find Her. The lyrics evoke poetic images are both obscure and sensuous. It has a dreamlike quality that underscores an existential loneliness. Art Garfunkel’s voice is heavenly: “What a dream I had dressed in organdy / clothed in crinoline / of smoky burgundy / softer than the rain / I wandered empty streets down / past the shop displays / I heard cathedral bells / dripping down the alley ways / as I walked on / and when you ran to me / your cheeks flushed with the night / we walked on frosted fields / of juniper and lamplight / I held your hand / and when I awoke / and felt you warm and near / I kissed your honey hair / with my grateful tears / oh, I love you / oh,  how I love you, girl.”

Eminem’s Love the Way You Lie is a tortured confessional. It’s Eminem’s voice throughout the breathtaking pounding rap. The minor key bridge sung by Rihanna, Eminem’s alter ego. This is about a deep abiding yet tortured love. It’s too strong, too possessive to survive: “Just gonna stand there /And watch me burn / But that's alright / Because I like / The way it hurts / Just gonna stand there / And hear me cry / But that's alright / Because I love / The way you lie / I love the way you lie / I love the way you lie /  I can't tell you what it really is / I can only tell you / what it feels like / And right now there's a steel knife / In my windpipe / I can't breathe / But I still fight / While I can fight / As long as the wrong feels right / It's like I'm in flight / High of a love / Drunk from the hate / It's like I'm huffing paint / And I love it the more that I suffer / I suffocate / And right before I’m about to drown / She resuscitates me.”


Now it’s time ladies and gentlemen. For my favorite romantic love songs of all time. Drum roll please…

Johnny Mathis. Wonderful Wonderful. . Mathis’ silky smooth vibrato and crystal clear diction is a perfect accompaniment to this jazzed up pop masterpiece: “Sometimes we walk hand in hand by the sea / And breathe in the cool salty air / You turn to me with a kiss in your eyes / And my heart feels a thrill beyond compare / Then your lips cling to mine / It’s Wonderful, Wonderful / Oh so wonderful my love / Sometimes we stand on top of the hill / And we gaze at the earth and the sky / I turn to you and you melt in my arms / There we are darling only you and I What a moment to share / It’s wonderful, wonderful / Oh, so wonderful my love”

Happy Valentines Day.

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