Another stylistic mode of the year in popular music was the turn to, or digging in of, an interest in the "Laurel Canyon" style of soft rock from the 70s, singer-songwriter folk. Indeed, 2012 has been a fascinating melange of two decades once thought mutually exclusive, the 70s and 80s. The best 70s soft rock song of this year, capturing the sense of melancholy and romance that decade epitomised at its best, has to be 'The Great Exhale'. "When I get in I will see you are there" feels both lovely and deeply sad.
A poem for my mother, July 15 When she was dying And I was in a different country I dreamt I was there with her Flying over the ocean very quickly, And arriving in the room like a dream And I was a dream, but the meaning was more Than a dream has – it was a moving over time And land, over water, to get love across Fast enough, to be there, before she died, To lean over the small, huddled figure, In the dark, and without bothering her Even with apologies, and be a kiss in the air, A dream of a kiss, or even less, the thought of one, And when I woke, none of this had happened, She was still far distant, and we had not spoken.
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