Don’t know if it’s the February sky — low and drizzly — but Bob Dylan’s “Oh Mercy” (1989) and “Love and Theft” (2001) drew me in recently. I’m struck by how precise and yet how loosey- goosey Dylan’s lyrics feel.
“What Good am I?” from “Oh Mercy” captures in such simple language and tones how I feel sometimes when I consider my place in my home and my community and the world.
“What good am I if I know and don’t do,
If I see and don’t say, if I look right through you,
If I turn a deaf ear to the thunderin’ sky,
What good am I?”
Contemplative. Gently pointed.
From “Mississippi” on “Love and Theft” there’s this oddly longing yet upbeat feel. The lines that linger for me:
“Well my ship’s been split to splinters and it’s sinking fast
I’m drownin’ in the poison, got no future, got no past
But my heart is not weary, it’s light and it’s free
I’ve got nothin’ but affection for all those who’ve sailed with me”
Also from “Love and Theft,” I’m just grooving on the easy rhythm of “Moonlight,” that feels like a sweet tribute to ’40s-era jazzy pop. Dylan seems to have chosen words for how well their syllables sync with the rhythm.
“The boulevards of cypress trees
The masquerades of birds and bees
The petals, pink and white, the wind has blown
Won’t you meet me out in the moonlight alone?”
As I listen and think about the way songwriters use language, I appreciate how writing is both mysterious and contrived, structural and free.
I think that’s why writers must give free rein to the spin of uncontrolled imaginings and then pull those reins to bring shape and narrative form in the service story. For free expression, the poets/songwriters may be the best teachers. For narrative structure, I love E.M. Forster’s “Aspects of the Novel.”