Love Minus Zero — No Limits

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My love she speaks like silence
Without ideals or violence,
She doesn’t have to say she’s faithful,
Yet she’s true, like ice, like fire.

People carry roses,
Make promises by the hours,
My love she laughs like the flowers,
Valentines can’t buy her.

In the dime stores and bus stations,
People talk of sitations,
Read books, repeat quotations,
Draw conclusions on the wall.

Some speak of the future,
My love she speaks softly,
She knows there’s no success like failure,
And then failure is no success at all.

The cloak and dagger dangles,
Madams light the candles,
In ceremonies of the horsemen,
Even the pawn must hold a grudge.

Statues made of match sticks,
Crumble into one another,
My love winks, she does not bother,
She knows too much to argue or to judge.

The bridge at midnight trembles,
The country doctor rambles,
Bankers’ neices seek perfection,
Expecting all the gifts that wise men bring.

The wind howls like a hammer,
The night blows cold and rainy,
My love she’s like some raven,
At my window with a broken wing.

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This was originally sung by Bob Dylan, but I consider the version sung by Joan Baez as the true masterpiece. Please listen to it if you haven’t.

Like all Bob Dylan verses, this one also has all these inexplicable references and impossible imageries. I am sure some very knowledgable person can tell me all the specifics they refer to, but in this case, I would like to keep myself “innocent”.

The poem works for me just as it is. Its as beautiful a love poem as can ever be and some of the lines are amazing; “She knows too much to argue or to judge”.

I also like its snide remarks about people like me — self-obsessed with our pursuit of causes and wisdom: read the third stanza!

Finally, there is a whole subterranean poiltics of love and romance which gets created here which I seem to find some bonding with.

Beautiful heartfelt imagery, creative wordplay, holding a mirror to oneself.. what more can one want in a love poem?