Loss and “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away”

1st October, 2010 - Posted by L. John Mason -

Hey you’ve got to hide your love away is a song written and song by John Lennon and released by the Beatles in 1965

Here I stand head in hand
Turn my face to the wall
If she’s gone I can’t go on
Feelin’ two-foot small

Everywhere people stare
Each and every day
I can see them laugh at me
And I hear them say

Hey you’ve got to hide your love away
Hey you’ve got to hide your love away

How can I even try
I can never win
Hearing them, seeing them
In the state I’m in

How could she say to me
Love will find a way
Gather round all you clowns
Let me hear you say

Hey you’ve got to hide your love away
Hey you’ve got to hide your love away

I am from the generation that call the 1960’s home. When thinking of losing my wife to cancer, this song came to my mind and I pondered as to why. It does not really to seem to fit because it was probably written for a youthful relationship ending and not really about losing a 30 year old friendship and marriage. And, hiding my love away does not really seem to fit… But, the feeling of loss of an intense relationship is embodied by my feelings of this song. I remember the acute emotional responses to relationships that seemed to end too soon. I also know that I am comfortable and so comforted by music from my youth in ways that ancient prayers, rituals, and melodies have given comfort to many other people who have suffered loss through human history.

There may be other songs or melodies that will evoke feelings and memories for me in the future that speak to my forboding thoughts of my future loss, but today, it is this song that has come to mind.

What songs, melodies, poems, or other musings come up for you when you find yourself in your dark emotional places? The ones that you enjoy when you feel happiness, excited, or in love might be somewhat different. Will happiness music or music of the sad moments trigger these emotions or are they triggered by our visits to these emotional thoughts?

May you dwell in the songs of joy, health and happiness much more than you find yourself basking in the melodies of sadness…