In Time and Blood: The Endless Variations of A Thousand Kisses Deep & Deciphering the Mystery of the Mystery Man

A Thousand Kisses Deep by the legendary Leonard Cohen: the gut-wrenching verses.

You came to me this morning
And you handled me like meat
You’d have to be a man to know
How good that feels, how sweet
My mirrored twin, my next of kin
I’d know you in my sleep
And who but you would take me in
A thousand kisses deep

I loved you when you opened
Like a lily to the heat
You see I'm just another snowman
Standing in the rain and sleet
But you don’t need to hear me now
And every word I speak
It counts against me anyhow
A thousand kisses deep

I know you had to lie to me
I know you had to cheat
To pose all hot and hide behind
The veils of sheer deceit
Our perfect porn aristocrat
So elegant and cheap
I’m old but I’m still into that
A thousand kisses deep

I know you had to lie to me,
I know you had to cheat.
But the Means no longer guarantee
The Virtue in Deceit.
That truth is bent, that beauty spent,
That style is obsolete -
Ever since the Holy Spirit went
A thousand kisses deep.

(So what about this Inner Light
That's boundless and unique?
I'm slouching through another night
A thousand kisses deep.)

The ponies run, the girls are young,
The odds are there to beat.
You win a while, and then it's done -
Your little winning streak.
And summoned now to deal
With your invincible defeat,
You live your life as if it's real
A thousand kisses deep.

(And sometimes when the night is slow

The wretched and the meek
We gather up our hearts and go
A thousand kisses deep)

I'm turning tricks; I'm getting fixed,
I'm back on Boogie Street.
I tried to quit the business -
Hey, I'm lazy and I'm weak.
But sometimes when the night is slow,
The wretched and the meek,
We gather up our hearts and go
A thousand kisses deep.

(And fragrant is the thought of you,
The file on you complete -
Except what we forgot to do
A thousand kisses deep.)

I'm turning tricks, I'm getting fixed

I'm back on boogie street
You lose your grip and then you slip
Into the masterpiece
And maybe I had miles to drive
And promises to keep
You ditch it all to stay alive
A thousand kisses deep

All soaked in sex, and pressed against
The limits of the sea:
I saw there were no oceans left
For scavengers like me.
We made it to the forward deck
I blessed our remnant fleet -
And then consented to be wrecked
A thousand kisses deep.

I’m good at love, I’m good at hate
It's in between I freeze
Been working out, but its too late
It’s been too late for years
But you look good, you really do
They love you on the street,
Somebody must have died for you
A thousand kisses deep

And I'm still working with the wine
Still dancing cheek to cheek
The band is playing Auld Lang Syne
But the heart will not retreat
I ran with Diz and Dante
I never had their sweep
But once or twice they let me play
A thousand kisses deep

The autumn moved across your skin
Got something in my eye
A light that doesn’t need to live
And doesn’t need to die
A riddle in the book of love
Obscure and obsolete
Until witnessed here in time and blood
A thousand kisses deep

(Well that's my story and I admit,
It's broken and it's bleak
But all the twisted pieces fit
A thousand kisses deep)


Deciphering the Mystery of the Mystery Man 

     So often my gnarled, tarred soul longs for the romance and desire to revive it back to its white hot lightening state of being.  So often, disappointment reigns as it distills into bitter jade.  So many attempts, so many hopes, so much failure and ruination.  How does one cull the courage to get back astride the horse, after it's thrown you off so many times before?  After madness, and near madness, anger, pain, and bloodlust.  What could possibly be left for the sad-sack losers and lonely hearts, laying broken in the street?  Kicked and knocked around, all sense curb-stomped and drained long ago.

     So what does it take for the heart to rise, the hope and colour to return?  The sex to come flooding back as the blood runs south? Some magician's elixir; a bourbon-scented alchemy to storm the gates of regret and fear.  What or who does it take to let go, one more time; to take one last swing? A magnetic hypnotist, an enigmatic conjurer, that can simultaneously secure and disarm, ignite and comfort; love and lust. A rakish and refined closet pervert, yet tender and sweet, to unite the severed halves and disparate compartments galvanized by time and betrayal.  An arcane man, who always was, lurking in the shadows, just out of reach.  A marquis from another time, dominant, but unassuming; who would know?  The Holy Grail, there all while, left unclaimed, waiting there for me to find.  To entrance me with his gilded blaze, to make me talk, to make me kiss, to make me want, once more.

The empathy he exhales, dissolves the old sentries; the carnality he dances around, floods my senses. I expose my delicate, alabaster neck, "Go ahead Daddy, clamp the choke-collar around me, once more."  And I can't get enough.