The Traitor Lyrics - Recent Songs - Leonard Cohen

Now the Swan it floated on the English river 

Ah the Rose of High Romance it opened wide 

A sun tanned woman yearned me through the summer 

And the judges watched us from the other side 

I told my mother "Mother I must leave you 

Preserve my room but do not shed a tear 

Should rumour of a shabby ending reach you 

It was half my fault and half the atmosphere" 

But the Rose I sickened with a scarlet fever 

And the Swan I tempted with a sense of shame 

She said at last I was her finest lover 

And if she withered I would be to blame 

The judges said you missed it by a fraction 

Rise up and brace your troops for the attack 

Ah the dreamers ride against the men of action 

Oh see the men of action falling back 

But I lingered on her thighs a fatal moment 

I kissed her lips as though I thirsted still 

My falsity had stung me like a hornet 

The poison sank and it paralyzed my will 

I could not move to warn all the younger soldiers 

That they had been deserted from above 

So on battlefields from here to Barcelona 

I'm listed with the enemies of love 

And long ago she said "I must be leaving, 

Ah but keep my body here to lie upon 

You can move it up and down and when I'm sleeping 

Run some wire through that Rose and wind the Swan" 

So daily I renew my idle duty 

I touch her here and there, I know my place 

I kiss her open mouth and I praise her beauty 

And people call me traitor to my face