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Don McLean's Tribute to Painter Vincent Van Gough:
"Vincent"
Starry, starry night.
Paint your palette blue and grey,
Look out on a summer's day,
With
eyes that know the darkness in my soul.
Shadows on the hills,
Sketch the trees and the daffodils,
Catch the breeze
and the winter chills,
In colors on the snowy linen land.
Now I understand what you tried to say to me,
How
you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they did not know how.
Perhaps
they'll listen now.
Starry, starry night.
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze,
Swirling clouds in violet haze,
Reflect
in Vincent's eyes of china blue.
Colors changing hue, morning field of amber grain,
Weathered faces lined in pain,
Are
soothed beneath the artist's loving hand.
Now I understand what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your
sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen, they did not know how.
Perhaps they'll listen now.
For they could not love you,
But still your love was true.
And when no hope was left in sight
On that starry,
starry night,
You took your life, as lovers often do.
But I could have told you, Vincent,
This world was never meant
for one
As beautiful as you.
Starry, starry night.
Portraits hung in empty halls,
Frameless head on nameless
walls,
With eyes that watch the world and can't forget.
Like the strangers that you've met,
The ragged men in the
ragged clothes,
The silver thorn of bloody rose,
Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.
Now I think I know
what you tried to say to me,
How you suffered for your sanity,
How you tried to set them free.
They would not listen,
they're not listening still.
Perhaps they never will...
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| Bill and His Boys: Building the La Luz NM House |
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| Hands on Hips: Father and Sons (Randolph & Ivan), circa, 1964 |
No song from popular music shows more understanding of the deep appreciation
for, and understanding of, life that is the mainstay of the meditative painter.
We are grateful to Mr. McLean and his insight into the painter's sensitivity
and the truth of the creative process.
Mr. McLean's lyrics, reflecting on the sufferage for sanity--and the drive to
share the truth of the creation of beauty with others loved by the painter, is particularly apropos to The
Bill Rane Story. Our greatest hope is that humanity can "listen" to the truth of the beauty on the canvas--incorporating
that truth into the fabric of everyday life thus leading to a better world.
Obviously, man kind's grave "ultra" rational understanding (ultramodernism and
indstrialized society) has not alleviated world suffering but has rather contributed to suffering--and even greater suffering.
We sincerely believe that the more primal, even "subconscious" understanding
of deeper--even "Jungian"--truths, as available through meditation and consideration of the "conversations" left on the
canvas' of beauty created by the great artists, are far more key to human happiness (whether micro or macro) than
the incomplete truth of simple "knowledge" with no "wisdom".
Thank you, Mr. McLean. Please allow us the liberty to say that you,
too, "are more beautiful..." And, while you might well be correct, that "perhaps they never will" listen or understand,
we choose to pray that you are very wrong on that solitary point.
Here at The Bill Rane Story, we mark you as a strong ally
in this--the noble struggle for human sanity--and the realization of happiness and contentement for mankind as a whole.
Your song reveals plainly the great secret... that beauty is really about sharing, love, freedom, respect and, ultimately, peace.
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