Leonard Cohen was a Montreal born singer-songwriter, poet and novelist. He passed away in 2016. In my younger years I was a huge fan of his. He was like an idol to me. I loved his music and poetic writings and looked up to him because I always wanted to be a writer and poet myself.
I've lived in Montreal a few times for several years and always hoped that I would by chance run into him or catch a glimpse of him. As fate would have it I did!
The first time it happened I was in Montreal. Carolyn and I were enjoying an interlude in a Portuguese park, refreshing ourselves in the ambient shade of a gazebo when we spied Cohen strolling down the sidewalk across the road. He was wearing a strict grey suit and appeared to be heading home. He quested for his keys, unlocked the door, entered and vanished out of sight and into what we would imagine to be his artful Spartan vintage chambers. Not the most engaging opportunity for me to greet him obviously, but I did harbor some small regret at not seizing this select circumstance. Carolyn and I vowed that if a similar opportunity would again appear we would not hesitate to exploit it.
A year or more passed. Carolyn and I moved away from Montreal and settled once again in Hamilton. I was being prepared to sacrifice a kidney to my father. We had suddenly become construction workers, living in a small apartment which looked onto the Niagara escarpment. Our lives now were like something happening to us. This was like riding a powerful wave and we had little choice but to go with the flow.
One Friday night Carolyn and I had just come home after having dinner. I sat down and turned on the computer, inviting one of my cats to leap onto my lap. The atmosphere was one of fixed unavoidable inactivity. Or so it seemed. I suppose it was more like that moment before the storm when the air is still and the birds stop singing.
Carolyn has an impulsive intuitive quality about her. The most jubilant adventures in my life have been the ones she has captained out of the blue. Sometimes she is like a throng of Mongolian wild horses I would entrust with the glorified artifact of freedom, and in front of them I would place a never setting sun to host their darkened silhouettes. She was as such that evening; just as I was about to liberate a slumberous yawn Carolyn unleashes this idea of getting in the car and hurtling the six and a half hours though the night toward Montreal.
Oddly enough I did not resist and I allowed myself to be guided by this clearly inspired thought, and I am so glad that I did. I find it difficult to describe in simple words just how vigorous these minutes were. To accurately benchmark our wholehearted willingness to follow through with this spontaneous plan I will mention an incident right at the beginning wherein we had to pull over quickly to investigate this incessant crashing noise which suddenly squealed from underneath our car along the highway. It seems a large perplexing piece of metal was hanging down from underneath our car which we guessed to be some kind of shield. We unhinged it and threw it in the trunk, pausing to consider for a second the fate of our journey. I think I’m kind of losing the craze of this story here with all these words, it is enough for you to know that we simply kept going; and if I could summon some superfluous special effect to articulate the energy of this scene you would then imagine two streaming trails of fire behind us as we shot onward.
Along the way I encountered a number of very interesting synchronistic goings-on. As we would break at rest-stops I would overhear key-words subtly stepping out of the background and into the foreground so as to seem almost straightforwardly directed at me. I kept hearing about Montreal from so many different individual sources that I was really beginning to wonder what all this promotion was about. I even once heard a person’s voice saying: “Just wait until you get to Montreal…” I had the unmistakable feeling that I was about to receive some present, an angel’s valentine I like to call it and that some divine force was busy embroidering this whole trip for us. After a few hours of driving we found a hotel. There is something about finding these cheap anonymous hotel rooms that always reminds of Leonard Cohen. There is this incognito aura about the late night hotel. Cohen once described discovering his hotel room as “the safe moment in the escape.”
Morning came and we drove on. The sky was low and dismal. We noticed rock symbols on the sides of the highway. Imitations of an Inuksuk, a landmark they say is used as a milepost by the Inuit of the northern Canadian arctic. Inuk meaning “human” and suk meaning “like”. If I play with the words I would have human-like or mortal milestone marking an elemental point along the journey toward the immortal spirit. An azoic inflexible cluster of rocks re-arranged into the image of man and in the semblance of supple flesh; an alchemical process which would relate back to the Philosopher’s Stone and the wondrous aim of transmuting base metals into gold. The Philosopher’s Stone being the definite condensation of refined matter, a metaphor for the inner spirit, gold symbolizing the state of the enlightened soul and base metals the imperfect and undeveloped state of being. “I’m turning to gold…” says L. Cohen in one of his poems. “Turning to gold. it’s a long process, they say, it happens in stages. This is to inform you that I’ve already turned to clay.”
We struck Montreal at about noon. The streets were hazy with drizzling rain. We hoped that we might by chance delight in a dry spell and re-explore some familiar sentimental area of town. Our casual prayers were answered the instant our feet hit the walk-way. The scene was at first drenched in grease and fog. The sun however was just about to pierce the clouds like a ponderous cannonball. I was standing at an intersection with Carolyn when I abruptly looked up to notice the luminous arc of a rainbow cutting the sky in half. I thought of the myths which used the rainbow bridge to span the ravines between heaven and earth. For the ancient Greeks the rainbow refers to Iris, the goddess who delivered messages from the gods on Mount Olympus. In Scandinavian mythology the rainbow was a bridge between the gods and the earth. In the Bible it is written that God said “...I set my rainbow in the clouds and it shall be a sign of the Covenant between me and the earth.” In the Chinese tradition, the rainbow is a symbol of marriage because the colors tethered to the shaft illustrates the coupling of the yin and the yang. But even more urgent to me was the promise of gold and the possibility of an imminent revelation.
That first burst of afternoon sunlight did eventually ripen into evening. We had re-visited most of our old haunts and indulged in every taste and appetite which had impressed itself into our service through out the day. Without aim at this point we simply walked buoyantly, murmuring to one another. We thereon came onto an unassuming gathering of people, straggling families and couples flocked beneath an expressway bridge which stretched out over the canal. We had no idea what brought this scattered group together. They reminded us of lost sheep somehow as they shuffled near the broad graffitied pillars and pinched grassy blotches of growth which seeded the dirt. A feeling of expectancy filled the sheltered night air. Carolyn suddenly pointed toward the distant sky. I turned to watch a spike of auric light climb quickly into the sky like a rocket before exploding into a loud shimmering blossom. A dozen more lights lifted off, shattering into many-colored prismatic patterns all over the frondescent sky.
The small-scale crowds about us started to cheer and so did we. We had come along way indeed for this fireworks concert. Carolyn and I reveled in our splendid chance discovery. We remarked to each other that recent hours had been melodious and that even before… ever since that energized thought was kindled to get us in the car and hightail ourselves to this very spot under the bridge, everything had been like a crafted dream. Later in the hotel room Carolyn and I took a moment to express our deep-felt thanks to the all-mighty director of fate before shutting off the light and going to sleep.
The next morning would have us preparing for our departure. Our mood was one of reluctance. I actually don’t think we’ve ever really made a single free-will choice to leave Montreal, always some greater responsibility had run us out of town. We would delay our adieu however with a plentiful breakfast at one of our sweetheart spots along the boulevard.
Upon entering the joint I took special note of the large golden egg propped up in a distinguishable location of the room. Cherub angels were also painted on one of the walls. Carolyn and I sat down in an appropriate booth and soaked in the atmosphere. I grinned and commented to Carolyn that she was sitting in my spot because a small sheeny plaque on her side had my family name engraved on it.
I began telling her that some photographs of Leonard Cohen were pinned on the wall near the entrance of the restaurant. I always thought it would be fitting to see him here. When the waitress came over Carolyn asked her if she had recently seen Cohen frequent the place. As I was misanthropically rolling my eyes into the back my skull our waitress then flippantly mentions that he was actually sitting right behind us having a fruit salad. Our jaws went slack and dropped. I turned to look prudently over my shoulder…and there, sure enough, was the man himself; sitting at the bar about ten feet away silhouetted in the flaxen sunshine which flared in from the window.
It took Carolyn and me a few minutes to reverse our disbelief. Carolyn then conceded her seat to me since my name was literally etched upon it. I was now in a much better position to study my venerated mentor. I decided that I would wait until I got the check seeing as I would have to walk by him to get over to the cash and pay. I would then greet him and shake his hand. Carolyn warned me that time was of the essence but I simply had too much respect for the man’s privacy. Cohen then upon finishing his fruit salad forthwith paid for his meal and walked out the door. Abashed I could not summon the nerve to chase him down.
Despite my failure to formally meet my idol I was ecstatic over the whole experience. There is also the common belief the third time something is attempted the more likely it is to succeed. The phrase third time’s the charm naturally comes to mind and Carolyn was snappy enough to remind me of it.
A year went by again. Carolyn and I once more found ourselves breakfasting in the same venue. We were not exactly expecting any miracles. If you used these stories as evidence than you would probably think glimpsing the famous poet to be as easy as spotting a pigeon. Not true. The man is never rooted in one place for very long. Seeing him on the street is more like sighting a Blue Heron in the moonlight, wading in an alleyway puddle. (Which Carolyn and I did incidentally, but that is another story altogether.)
Cohen never showed up this time; but we were not grieved by the fact at all. We did afteral bring a camera with us this time around, just in case. But as I just mentioned we did not lament. We still firmly believed that a formal meeting with him was meant to be, that it was somehow already woven within the tapestry of time and that our previous encounters presaged this event.
We walked out of the bistro and into the sunshine. Carolyn straightaway bolted in an unexpected direction. I followed her, darting across the street and onto the sidewalk. Carolyn tells me how she would like to snap a shot of Cohen’s house with the camera. We were now in Cohen territory. I looked to my left and suddenly through a singular chink in the leaves I spied…Mr. Leonard Cohen.
He was sitting on a bench by himself in the park. I seized Carolyn's wrist and pulled her to me, hissing the words, “Look over there!”
We were then instantly aghast, flustered and nervous. But it was a good fear. A fear that is not fear at all but more like an impassioned level of profound anticipation. The shaken feeling a play-actor or comedian must have before a performance. Carolyn and I agreed to follow the sidewalk until we reached the small stone path. We would then orbit the gazebo once like a satellite and slingshot ourselves to him. There we were, marching toward him like the secret police.
“Mr. Cohen?” we entreated. “Yes?” He seemed almost alarmed but succeeded in staying sunny and debonair. We told him that we were fans and asked him kindly to pose for a picture. Coming into his presence you can really feel the atmosphere change and the air pressure transform, your ears seal up like vaults as though you were enduring a sudden rise in altitude.
“Let’s do it” he says warmly and puts an arm around my back. Carolyn fumbles with the camera a moment. I am totally speechless at this point, unable to utter a single word. I could only manage to loosen an elongated laugh. I would imagine that my squelched wit and subsequent silence revealed more about my sense of awe and glory than some piercing wisecrack would have. As Carolyn lowered her camera to signal the end of the session, Cohen’s hand remained on my shoulder for several very patient moments. I found this fleeting occurrence to be the most powerful of all. His fingers bled such persuasive tenderness and his bearing radiated this universal soft-hearted might. He shook our hands once more and wished us a wonderful day. I turned back one last time and finally managed to say thank you and how very grateful I was for the handshake. He humbly acknowledged me and repeated in a deeply sonorous voice…Have a very wonderful day.
In an interesting and eerie twist to this story; my perception of Leonard Cohen has drastically changed since those times. You are welcome to read a past article of mine to find out why:
Was Leonard Cohen A Secret Agent?
