The Darkness

The blues is a primal form. Anybody can do it. Just three chords. Every song has the same tune. Even the words don’t vary much; they fall within strict conventions. The blues are not so much music as a state of mind. And that state of mind is the one often called “Depression.” Nothing changes; just three chords hammering in your skull. Leonard Cohen’s “The Darkness” may be the ultimate blues.   “The Darkness” as he describes it is a very clear and accurate description of clinical “depression”: “The present's, not that pleasant; just a lot of things to do” “I got no taste for anything at all” Yup. But primal as depression is, generic “darkness” sounds as though it may be deeper than that. It may encompass all the Buddhists refer to as dukkha: “ill-being.” Depression, suffering, disease, moral evil. “The Darkness” also sounds like a disease:  “I caught the darkness… drinking from your cup.” The darkness here comes from a woman. This is a common, though not unalterable, blues tradition. It is also the common explanation for the darkness throughout culture. In the Bible, the darkness comes from Eve. In Greek myth, from Pandora. But more specifically, who is the woman holding the cup? The red women, holding the cup:  “it was red behind your eyes?” The reference seems to be clearly to the “Whore of Babylon” in Revelations: the “Scarlet woman,” “Babylon the Great, the mother of prostitutes and of all the abominations of the Earth.” Whore of Babylon: Romanesque 17:1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters: 17:2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication 17:3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. 17:4 And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: 17:5 And upon her forehead was a name written a mystery: Babylon The Great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the Earth 17:6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration. 17:9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sat.17:10 … 17:18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigns over the kings of the earth. Whore of Babylon: Russina, 19th century. Not Rome literally: Rome represents, like Babylon, earthly power—government, social power. In addition, the beast, woman, and water all suggest natural fertility, more broadly, what we call “nature,” the realm of things that are born and die. It is, according to this song at least, the craving for earthly possessions and for things that are born and die that causes depression, sin, and suffering. Cigarettes, alcohol, sex, are trivial examples. Besides being good Christianity, this analysis is good Buddhism. Dukkha is caused by craving, by desire.
Whore of Babylon: William Blake