Leonard Cohen Bucharest "Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue..." I Can't Forget Impromptu Poem

September 29, 2012

Leonard Cohen's big smile, beaming after his impromptu poem voiceover

At the Bucharest concert on Sept 22, during I Can't Forget, Leonard Cohen recited an impromptu new poem.

And it was a funny one.

LC seems to be having such a good time on this tour. A lot of fun.

And this is another instance. When he finished reciting the poem, he exchanged a big impish smile with Sharon Robinson.

Delightful.

Roses are red

Violets are blue

I'm lonely again

But I'm glad it's with you

I'm glad it's with you

Glad it was me

I called other people

But no one was free

I Can't Forget has been performed 15 times in 26 concerts (as at Paris concert 1 on Sept 28.12)

From the Leonard Cohen Old Ideas tour statistics on Setlist.fm

Piata Constitutiei, Bucharest, Romania on September 22, 2012 Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland on September 14, 2012 Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland on September 11, 2012 Wembley Arena, London, England on September 9, 2012 Wembley Arena, London, England on September 8, 2012 Warsteiner HockeyPark, Mönchengladbach, Germany on September 6, 2012 Møllenparken, Aalborg, Denmark on August 26, 2012 Rosenborg Castle, Copenhagen, Denmark on August 25, 2012 Olympisch Stadium, Amsterdam, Netherlands on August 22, 2012 Olympisch Stadium, Amsterdam, Netherlands on August 21, 2012 Sint-Pietersplein, Ghent, Belgium on August 18, 2012 Sint-Pietersplein, Ghent, Belgium on August 17, 2012 Sint-Pietersplein, Ghent, Belgium on August 15, 2012 Sint-Pietersplein, Ghent, Belgium on August 14, 2012 Sint-Pietersplein, Ghent, Belgium on August 12, 2012

Uploaded by Razvan Tudose

Snippets from Leonard Cohen's show in Bucharest, at Piata Consitutiei, on 22.09.2012
Cued to start at 3.16 with the start of "I Can't Forget"

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• Photo at the top is a video screen shot of the venue screen
• For more about "I Can't Forget" recitations, see my earlier post Leonard Cohen's "I Can't Forget" with Voiceover Recitation Last Verse of Dover Beach-Ghent 2nd Night  and Allan Showalter's  post  What Is It That Leonard Cohen Can’t Forget?  on 1heckofaguy.com

Leonard Cohen's "I Can't Forget" with Voiceover Recitation Last Verse of Dover Beach-Ghent 2nd Night

Video Screenshot from "I Can't Forget"

August 16, 2012

Shortly after I posted about Leonard Cohen's opening Ghent concert voiceover in French during "I Can't Forget",  I noticed a second video with a different voiceover, this time mostly in English.  It was uploaded on August 15. So I am guessing it was from the second concert on August 14.

Once again, LC's recitation was during the song not apart from it.

It had the cadence of a poem, but which one? It didn't sound like one of his...and it wasn't.  A little digging led me to the following poem.

 Dover Beach (last verse) by Matthew Arnold

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

NB. At 3.14, LC starts off in French, with the same words in the first concert, then switches to the English poem at 3.30

Leonard Cohen @ St.-Pietersplein Gent : 'God bless' - Nnieuws.be HD  (cued to start at 3.14)

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• Tom Sakic reported on the leonardcohenforum "that in Stuttgart and Moscow, Leonard introduced Born in Chains with the recitation of poem, Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold".(Setlists of the World Tour 2010 )
• The video was captured mostly from the venue screens. As one can see by the top photo, the videographer was quite far from the stage.