"Alexandra Leaving" as written by Leonard Cohen and Sharon Robinson....
Due to a publisher block, we are not authorized to display these lyrics.
Lyrics submitted by killingjuliet
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
Leonard Cohen changes Alexandria to Alexandra, making the loss more firmly that of love. The song, in Cohen's hands, becomes about how to face the loss of a lover and all the accompanying promises and expectations. The warrior's exhortation to face up to the loss of life on the eve of battle transforms into the lover's counsel to be strong and accept the loss of a relationship.
The song as written carries no particular significance to specific biographical events in Cohen's life but is more of a symbolic dirge carrying many layers of meaning.
Strange that others still ignore it after reading this exc. comment.
It would be more unusual if this song didn't work on multiple levels.
I've alway thought it was about the end of a relationship, the moment when you accept it's really over but you have yet to go through the motions (and still feel something for your partner)
Particularly
As someone long prepared for the occasion;
In full command of every plan you wrecked -
Do not choose a coward's explanation
that hides behind the cause and the effect.
i.e. face the fact that you need to end things.
I thought Alexandra leaving was metaphorical, your feelings for her are ending.
Anyway this is one of my all time favourite songs, absolutely beautiful.
She will go, you are prepared to what will happen to you since you've been through this experience, but you will suffer anyway as the first day. And if you don't suffer the loss of love, you have not fallen in love.
"As someone long prepared for the occasion;
In full command of every plan you wrecked -
Do not choose a coward's explanation
that hides behind the cause and the effect".
You are prepared, but there are no excuses,
face the fact and suffer what you have to suffer.
You will suffer anyway.
"It's not a trick, your senses all deceiving,
A fitful dream, the morning will exhaust"
There is no way out, no trick, you have loved with all your senses,
wisdom will not help here, the light of the morning will make as real in all your flesh.
"Do not say the moment was imagined;
Do not stoop to strategies like this"
Don't fool yourself. Again the same message.
"And you who were bewildered by a meaning;
Whose code was broken, crucifix uncrossed -
Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving.
Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost"
Don't ask for a meaning. Just say goodbye.
Don't mix with explanations, don't stayed linked to the past,
even if it was an epiphany, .
Mourn it as much as you need, assume it,
code broken (no words to explain it),
no religion to relieve it (crucifix uncrossed),
reality is there with its full power,
whatever yoe ito with your mind.
Face it: It's the only way to be redeemed.
Beautiful words chosen by Leonard to say this.
I believe that the love affair was a long one, however, like Antony with the city of Alexandria, not a short one. Leonard is capable of writing very explicit sex scenes from time to time, and I think if this was about a one night stand there would be more of that. Rather, he says things like:
Even though she sleeps upon your satin;
Even though she wakes you with a kiss.
Do not say the moment was imagined;
I interpret this to mean that that it is the simplest mundane scene such as her lying in his bed, or a single kiss, that in her absence has become such a powerful and painful image that he considers anaesthetising himself by forgetting it or even denying that it ever really happened.
.
I believe the lover is dying or has died. The line "Alexandra leaving with her lord", suggests this to me. In the mind of the singer, she is ascending, rather than leaving with another guy. His constant exhortation to "say good-bye to Alexandra" also suggests to me that this is a final exit.
Just out of interest, I'm pretty sure the line is "Your FIRST commitments, tangible again", not "FIRM commitments". I see it written as "firm" everywhere. I am a singer, and had been performing the song with the word "first", when I read "firm" on Cohen's website.
I like "first" because it conjures up an image of a guy looking back on the earliest days of this beloved relationship, and recalling the promises they made to each other.
Of course I listened to it again to see if my interpretation changed, but it still sounds like "first" to me. That line is another reason why I think the relationship is not a one night stand.
I've enjoyed reading everyone's comments. This is my first!
There are many wonderful songs comparing the loss of love to the loss of a kingdom or porperty (think Fleetwood Mac's "rulers make bad lovers/ you better put your kingdom up for sale"). The metaphor is very powerful in this song, and the writing is exquisite. I am a poet myself, and capturing that single important moment in time is the hardest thing to do. Cohen does this so beautifully here it makes my heart ache in its simplicity.
Now how can the lyrics on this site be corrected?
I think, that AL is about feeling, that you get when you have to leave some beloved person. But it is not braking up, there is no fight, no argument, no bitterness. Of course, I was thinking of death. Especially when you read the poem, that inspired Cohen- The God abandons Antony by Constantine P. Cavafy. But it´s Alexandria, the town, that is dying.
The god forsakes Antony
When suddenly, at midnight, you hear
an invisible procession going by
with exquisite music, voices,
don’t mourn your luck that’s failing now,
work gone wrong, your plans
all proving deceptive–don’t mourn them uselessly.
As one long prepared, and graced with courage,
say goodbye to her, the Alexandria that is leaving.
Above all, don’t fool yourself, don’t say
it was a dream, your ears deceived you:
don’t degrade yourself with empty hopes like these.
As one long prepared, and graced with courage,
as is right for you who were given this kind of city,
go firmly to the window
and listen with deep emotion, but not
with the whining, the pleas of a coward;
listen–your final delectation–to the voices,
to the exquisite music of that strange procession,
and say goodbye to her, to the Alexandria you are losing.
But what about the last strophe? "You, who were bewildered by a meaninig, whose code was broken, crucifix uncrossed....." In this point of view it seems to me, that these two people are lovers and one of them, I suppose the man, has to get back to family, becouse of duty, becouse of illness, who knows. Once he vowed to stand by a woman-his wife, even though his heart is no more with her. He didn´t mean to be unfaithfull, but something happend (his moral code was broken).
But maybe (probably) Cohen didn´t mean some particular situation, he just used the poem, turn it a little bit to some other and slightly mysterious meaning just to make us feel the way we feel, when listening to it. The inevitable lost of something beautiful, of somebody deeply beloved, that will never come back.
My daughter is three. At the most bizarre hours she wakes me with a kiss, joins us in our bed, smashes me in the nose with a hardback storybook, and penetrates my armoured cynicism. The love of a father for his daughter is not sexual, but it is sensual in a non-rational and innocent way. When she told me she had a "boyfriend," my momentary impulse was jealousy: "who is this punk?" It turns out he was a younger man: only two. But a punk nonetheless, I say!
Losing her to another man, or to death (likely my own) is something that will be heartrending -- but natural and of course inevitable. I hope to face that moment with love, compassion and dignity; I will probably blub like a baby. That's what "Alexandra Leaving" says to me.
Firstly you cannot completely understand this song without knowing the background of the plutarch story and the Cavafy poem and the historical context. Cohen has mixed it up a bit. But here I agree with MichaelBarry about the range of interpretations. The mixing up is its essence. Multiple meanings are an inherent part of the appeal of literature and here it is mixed up so that we cannot tell what kind of loss it is but only very clearly that this is about facing imminent loss. Representing a city by a woman is a traditional literary device (it's Biblical even). There's support for an interpretation of losing the woman to another man, for her dying, for Alexandra to be the historical city and because of these ambiguities the song is therefore about all loss and especially Alexandra represents life itself and her loss is the occasion (death) for which each is long prepared. So it transcends the mere historical event and makes it timeless and something with which we can all empathise.
For me this even makes the TS Eliot idea of building on previous literature seem a bit more justifiable.
Having understood the background of the plutarch story and historical context, in reply to andyhill interesting analysis (last year) I would say that "Do not say the moment was imagined" refers in fact not in fact to the past with Alexandra but to the moment of premonition (corresponding to the procession through the city) when you foresee the loss - this is "Alexandra leaving". Do not pretend you did not foresee her leaving, do not tell yourself that it is not going to happen. But the "drink it in" is also an exhortation to continue enjoying Alexandra (life) while fully facing the fact that you are about to lose her. The actual loss which will follow is "Alexandra lost".
Do you really think that a song has only one meaning?
Open people's mind for possibilities instead of closing them with limitations.
This isn't mathematics class; It's literature, now.
I like your summary, by the way. Very succinctly put.
And radiant beyond your widest measure
They fall among the voices and the wine.
It's not a trick, your senses all deceiving,
A fitful dream, the morning will exhaust
And you who were bewildered by a meaning;
Whose code was broken, crucifix uncrossed
The last two lines above explain every lyric of L. Cohen. The meaning is not in the words themselves. The words are intended to transport the listener beyond the boundaries of material experience, beyond the imprisonment of ego. The symbolism in the lines evoke a transcendent vision of what we truly are.