TIMES, CHIMES, RESONANCE, AND LOOSE ENDS

“It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.” – Samuel Adams

“I love a great mystery. And I’m fascinated by the greatest unsolved mystery. Do we see reality as it is? If I close my eyes I can imagine that everything we experience, everything we see, think, and do, is unfolding simultaneously in a parallel universe. And if so, how many copies of our cells exist? And might our mental states be conjoined?”    

                                        MR. ROBOT, Season 3, ep 1

Some very timely thoughts in this placeholder while working on the next entry… About freedom, why we’re all here, what we’re fighting for, and how wishing for someone’s freedom, always, is the very best way to tell them you love them. Thanks to Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Jackson Browne, respectively, for the very important words, which only seem to grow in importance, and a strange pertinence, as we barrel down all these twisting quantum routes together as life unfolds. As it should. As it’s supposed to.

We are all lovers in dangerous times now, my friends, to borrow from the celestial Bruce Cockburn. But love abides. 

"Far between sundown's finish and midnight's broken toll

We ducked inside the doorway, thunder crashing

As majestic bells of bolts struck shadows in the sounds

Seeming to be the chimes of freedom flashing

Flashing for the warriors whose strength is not to fight

Flashing for the refugee on the unarmed road of flight

And for each and every underdog soldier in the night

 We gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing

Through the city's melted furnace, unexpectedly we watched

With faces hidden here while the walls were tightening

As the echo of the wedding bells before the blowin' rain

Dissolved into the wild bells of lightning

Yeah, tolling for the rebel, tolling for the rake

Tolling for the luckless, the abandoned and forsaked

Tolling for the outcast, burnin' constantly at stake

 We gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing

Through the mad mystic hammering of the wild ripping hail

The sky cracked its poems in naked wonder

That the clinging of the church bells blew far into the breeze

Leaving only bells of lightning and its thunder

Striking for the gentle, striking for the kind

Striking for the guardians and protectors of the mind

And the poet and the painter far beyond behind his rightful time

 We gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing

In the wild cathedral evening the rain unraveled tales

For the disrobed faceless forms of no position

Tolling for the tongues with no place to bring their thoughts

All written down in taken-for-granted situations

Tolling for the deaf an' blind, tolling for the mute

For the mistreated, mateless mother, the mistitled prostitute

For the misdemeanor outlaw, chained and cheated by pursuit

And we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing

Even though a cloud's white curtain in a far-off corner flashed

As the hypnotic splattered mist was slowly lifting

Electric light still struck like arrows, fired but for the ones

Condemned to drift or else be kept from drifting

Tolling for the searching ones, on their speechless, seeking trail

For the lonesome-hearted lovers with too personal a tale

And for each unharmful, gentle soul misplaced inside a jail

We gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing

Starry-eyed and laughing, I recall when we were caught

Trapped by no track of hours for they hang suspended

As we listened one last time and we watched with one last look

Spellbound and swallowed as the tolling ended

Tolling for the aching ones whose wounds cannot be nursed

For the countless confused, accused, misused, strung-out ones and worse

And for every hung-up person in the whole wide universe

 We gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing…..

We met out on open streets when we had no place to go

I remember how my heart beat when you said I love you so

Then little by little we choked out all the life that our love could hold

Oh no

It's like we had a noose and baby without check

We pulled until it grew tighter around our necks

Each one waiting for the other, darlin', to say when

Well baby you can meet me tonight on the loose end

We didn't count tomorrows, as we took what we could and baby we ran

There was no time for sorrow, every place we went I held your hand

And when the night closed in I was sure your kisses told me all I had to know

But oh no

It's like we held a noose and baby without check

We pulled until it grew tighter around our necks

Each one waiting for the other, darlin', to say when

Well baby you can meet me tonight on the loose end

Our love has fallen around us like we said it never could

We saw it happen to all the others but to us it never would

Well how could something so bad, darling, come from something that was so good

I don't know

It's like we held a noose and baby without check

We pulled until it grew tighter around our necks

Each one waiting for the other, darlin', to say when

Well baby you can meet me tonight on the loose end…….

Time will come when we know what happened here

Change will come in time and make it clear

We learn one thing if we learn at all

In the secret wars we call our lives

Anything can happen

We watch the days, we make our plans

We change in ways a life demands

But whatever pleasure this life may allow

I'll give you the love I have for you now

Because anything can happen

In a world so full of fear

Dreams are whispered in the dead of night

And people disappear

But you hear my heart and you know I'm still here

Although you know and I know you know

While I swear I'll never let you go

Anything can happen

Yeah, if this love can happen here

Anything can

We watch the days we make our plans

We change in ways a life demands

I'll always remember this time, this place

The hope in your voice, the light on your face

Because anything can happen

In a world so full of pain

People give their lives to making war

And we call those people sane

But I love you where your dreams remain

Though you never say it anymore

One day there'll be an end to this war

And who knows

We may see what we're here for

Anything can happen."