Nick Flynn Comments

THE DAY LOU REED DIED It's not like his songs are going to simply evaporate but since the news I can't stop listening to him on endless shuffle - familiar, yes, inside me, yes, which means I'm alive, or was, depending on when you read this. Now a song called Sad Song, the last one on Berlin, sung now from the other side, just talk, really, at the beginning, then the promise or threat, I'm gonna stop wasting my time, but what else are we made of, especially now? A chorus sings sad song sad song sad song sad song. I knew him better than I new my own father, which means through these songs, which means not at all, They died on the same day, O what a perfect day, maybe at the same moment, maybe both their bodies are laid out now in the freezer, maybe side by side, maybe holding hands, waiting for the fire or the earth or the man or the salt - If I could I'd let the birds devour whatever's left & carry them into the sky, but all I can do it seems is lie on the couch & shiver, pull a coat over my body as if it were all I had, as if I the one sleeping outside, as if it were my body something was leaving, rising up from inside me & the coat could hold it inside maybe a little longer. –- Nick Flynn Published in The New Yorker, Nov.25,2013