Leonard Cohen revisits his house in Hydra, where he wrote Bird on a Wire ( "and there's the wire"!)and many other songs. This is the house he shared with Marianne, his muse, and the Marianne of SO LONG MARIANNE . He is accompanied by his backing singers Perla Batalla and Julie Chistensen. Part of the 1988 film SONGS FROM THE LIFE OF LEONARD COHEN. During the interview for that film I asked him whether his Marianne was the same Marianne as David Blue's Marianne. "How do you know that?" he asked. But of course it was in his lyrics:
I loved Marianne in the winter
In the loft of her favorite lover
She was growing older
The winter nights were cold
She told me I'm frightened
I said yes I know
Her eyes held me to her
They burned with such a fire
For the saints on the walls
Holy candles in the halls
For those who had left her
I held her and cried
Oh Marianne you are beautiful
To be this friend
To a stranger who
Leaves you only to fall
Do not cry you have helped me
I will not say goodbye
I knew her from another song
Her older poet wrote before
We played it in the morning laughing on the floor
Till he came knocking on the lower East Side door
Yes you know I miss her
Her and her stories of the night
I called her a rabbit
She gave me back my life
I haven't heard her voice since the Isle of Wight
Oh Marianne you are beautiful
To be this friend
To a stranger who
Leaves you only to fall
Do not cry you have helped me
I will not say goodbye
In the interview Leonard calls her MariannAH, just as David Blue sings her name.