And The Veil Is Hidden Behind A Veil

You are right.
There are no mists,
or veils, or distances.
But the mist is
surrounded by a mist;
and the veil is hidden
behind a veil;
and the distance
continually draws away
from the distance.
That is why
there are no mists,
or veils, or distances.
That is why it is called
The Great Distance
of Mists and Veils.
It is here
that The Traveler
becomes The Wanderer,
and The Wanderer
becomes The One Who Is Lost,
and The One Who Is Lost

becomes The Seeker,
and The Seeker becomes
The Passionate Lover,
and The Passionate Lover
becomes The Beggar,
and The Beggar
becomes the Wretch,
and The Wretch becomes
The One Who
Must Be Sacrificed,
and The One Who Must
Be Sacrificed becomes
The Resurrected One,
and The Resurrected One
becomes the One Who Has
Transcended The Great Distance
of Mists and Veils.
Then for a thousand years,
or the rest of the afternoon,
such a One spins
in the Blazing Fire of Changes,

embodying all the transformations,
one after the other,
and then beginning again,
and then ending again,
86,000 times a second.
Then such a One,
if he is a man,
is ready to love the woman;
and such a One,
if she is a woman,
is ready to love the man
who can put into song
The Great Distance
of Mists and Veils.
Is it you who is waiting,
or is it me?

--Leonard Cohen *
Book of Longing

THE PERPLEXED SCENE WHERE WE STAND

I am so often accused of gloominess and melancholy.
And I think I'm probably the most cheerful man around.
I don't consider myself a pessimist at all.
I think of a pessimist as someone who is waiting
for it to rain. And I feel completely soaked to the skin.
I think those descriptions of me are quite inappropriate
to the gravity of the predicament that faces us all.
I've always been free from hope.
It's never been one of my great solaces.
I feel that more and more we're invited to make ourselves
strong and cheerful. I think that it was Ben Jonson who said,
I have studied all the theologies and all the philosophies,
but cheerfulness keeps breaking through. *

LEONARD COHEN
9/21/34---11/7/16: Everybody Knows