There are songs too sad for me to sing
to sing that is, without tearing up
and who can wait for the singer to recover
and compose themselves sufficiently to continue…
At first there was just one song I couldn’t manage
Elvis Presley’s “In the Ghetto” – I could listen
but when I tried to sing it -my throat closed
and my eyes watered – I could not perform
As years go by more songs are added to the canon
of those I cannot get through without weeping
and often I cannot listen either – are they
songs of mourning, laments, requiems
nothing so formal, but tales of the human condition
the mere brevity of which is tragedy enough,
or the near impossibility of finishing a shared life
at exactly the same moment…
Dolly Parton’s “Coat of Many Colours” might be considered
kitsch if it were not true or true enough and I weep to hear
the sweetness of her sometime collaborator
Linda Ronstadt who has lost her voice to Parkinson’s
and sings only within the loving circle of family.
The exquisitely sad songs of Charlie Dore – a woman pretending
her lover lives on the other side of the world in “Australia”
so as not to acknowledge his abandonment
– he must be sleeping while she endures the day…
The rubato moments when Patsy Cline’s rich voice
almost catches, falters, as it lays down
the tragic tales of loss, longing and betrayal
sung to cheerful melodies that belie the sentiment.
Joni Mitchell wishing for a “River” to skate away on
surely the saddest Christmas song
Billie Holiday singing “Strange Fruit”
a lump rises in my throat even as I write
and to think of all those who left us too soon
their lives driven, and driven down, by the need
to perform, entertain, be loved…
Janis Joplin, Nick Drake, Prince
John Lennon, Jim Morrison
Ian Dury who sang of “Sweet Gene Vincent”
“Young, and old, and gone…”
so many more…
These are the singers and musical moments that undo me…
I used to say that I listened to sad music when I was happy
and that happy songs could elevate my lower moods
but boundaries blur and I see poignancy everywhere
and there are songs too sad for me to sing…
© Andrew Wilson, 2025
Over at dVerse Poets Pub, merrildsmith in Poetics invites us to write about music and this is also the theme for next month’s meeting of my “in the real world” local library poetry group…