The Borders of our Lives

I worked from home yesterday and revisited Simon and Garfunkel, mainly because when listening to the Helplessness Blues by Fleet Foxes recently I was hearing a lot of Simone and Garfunkel. I had my own personal revival of Simon and Garfunkel back when I was at university, and have always liked them, but don’t actually listen to them that often these days so initially I was trying to figure out which song it called to mind. I think it is Homeward Bound, but perhaps it is just a general S and G vibe I’m getting.

In the process I was listening to The Dangling Conversation, and rediscovered that it is quite poetic, in more ways than one. It describes a situation I don’t want to be in, but sometimes feel I might be prone to, because I am often dissatisfied with the result when I try to have any sort of challenging or direct conversation with someone (I think I’ve said all I can say in the moment, then go home, ruminate, and wish I’d taken things further). Maybe they’re just hard, which is why people write songs about them, especially when much hangs (no pun intended) on the outcome for yourself – and your wonder if you’re the only person hearing the ocean roar – or them. But I feel the need to attempt to dig deeper more often than I do (for the good of others, and myself, not just out of curiousity). So, without further ado, here are the poetic lyrics of this song (listen here):

The Dangling Conversation

It's a still life water color,

Of a now late afternoon,

As the sun shines through the curtain lace

And shadows wash the room.

And we sit and drink our coffee

Couched in our indifference,

Like shells upon the shore

You can hear the ocean roar

In the dangling conversation

And the superficial sighs,

The borders of our lives.

And you read your Emily Dickinson,

And I my Robert Frost,

And we note our place with bookmarkers

That measure what we've lost.

Like a poem poorly written

We are verses out of rhythm,

Couplets out of rhyme,

In syncopated time

And the dangling conversation

And the superficial sighs,

Are the borders of our lives.

Yes, we speak of things that matter,

With words that must be said,

"Can analysis be worthwhile?"

"Is the theatre really dead?"

And how the room is softly faded

And I only kiss your shadow,

I cannot feel your hand,

You're a stranger now unto me

Lost in the dangling conversation

And the superficial sighs,

In the borders of our lives.

Written by Paul Simon.

Picture from here.