Every time we say goodbye, I die a little,
Every time we say goodbye, I wonder why a little,
Why the Gods above me, who must be in the know
Think so little of me, they allow you to go.
When you’re near, there’s such an air of spring about it,
I can hear a lark somewhere, begin to sing about it,
There’s no love song finer, but how strange the change from major to minor, Every time we say goodbye. He also intuited the presence of a spiritual support system for us humans, supports such as guardian angels, as he wrote in “True Love,” from the 1955 motion picture, “High Society:”
For you and I have a guardian angel On high, with nothing to do But to give to you and to give to me Love forever, true. He understood the transformative experience of sexual love and how it can give us glimpses of higher realms. As he wrote in “Just One of Those Things,” from the 1935 Broadway musical, “Jubilee:” It was just one of those nights, Just one of those fabulous flights, A trip to the moon on gossamer wings, Just one of those things. Porter recognized that there are powers that can be exerted by the mind and heart that can transfigure another person. He said it beautifully in “All Through the Night,” from his mega-hit 1934 Broadway show,
“Anything Goes:” All through the night, From a height far above
You and your love bring me ecstasy.
Again in “You Do Something to Me,” from 1931’s “Fifty Million Frenchmen” on Broadway, he sings of the mesmerizing effects that one heart can have upon another, referring to a kind of magic power:
You do something to me Something that simply mystifies me Tell me, why should it be? You have the pow’r to hypnotize me Let me live ‘neath your spell. Do do that voodoo that you do so well.
In “It’s De-Lovely,” from the 1936 musical “Red Hot and Blue,” he can hear the silent whispers of the powers of Nature herself:
What a swell night this is for romance.
You can hear dear Mother Nature murmuring low, “Let yourself go!”
While very much earth-bound – an equestrian accident in which his horse crushed his legs, led to osteomyelitis and numerous surgeries that made walking difficult, even with a cane – he tasted of the life of the heavens. In “I Love You, Samantha,” from “High Society,” Bing Crosby’s character sings Porter’s lyrical lyrics:
“We could ride a star and ride it high.”
Porter sensed how transcendental each moment could be when one finds oneself in that blessed state called love. From “Begin the Beguine,” from “Broadway Melody of 1940,” we hear:
What moments divine, what rapture serene.
Oh yes, let them begin the beguine, make them play
Till the stars that were there before remain above you
Till you whisper to me once more, “Darling, I love you”
And we suddenly know what heaven we’re in.
It was being in love that gave Porter these insights into higher realm phenomena. But sometimes the magic and mystery of love confounded even him, so he turned to the Source for guidance, as he did in “What is This Thing called Love?” from the hit Broadway show of 1929, “Wake Up and Dream:”
“I ask the Lord in Heaven above What is this thing called love?” Romantic love was that sublime thing that Porter wrote more about than anything else. While its mystery sometimes eluded him, his passion for love and his passion for writing songs about love gave him glimpses into some of the workings of the very heavens themselves.
