Leonard Cohen — An Orchard of Shore Trees

An orchard of shore trees precise because of autumn etches its branches in the grey silk river The edge of the sky fills up with blue and soft sand A barge bearing lights like the leaning faces of motionless immortal sailors trails behind a cat o'nine tails made of dark chain punishing the silken water We never see the river run blood red The yellow sun is lost forever Its loyal sky is crumbling like a slow avalanche into its thickening edge of soft blue sand Darkness makes a home for the world The serpents rise swanlike from the water hurl their narrow tongues at the iron hulks of the dreaming tethered ships If there are humans left like me along this natural shore they do not dare cry out My coat is the colour of the ruined sky my fingers of the soft blue sand