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Like most songs, this is best experienced listening -- but the lyrics pack a wallop on their own, as well. Kat Eggleston is a midwest-based folk singer who, at least in some instances, is possession of what I'd call something as close to a "Cohen-esque" muse as anyone I've yet encountered. It's exemplified in the following, "Outside Eden," from her 1997 CD of the same name on the Waterbug label.

I took you to the desert, to the mountain,
to the shore.
I took you to my mother's house,
and took you on the floor.
You could call it hunger,
You could call it war,
You could call it Golden Glory --
It was all of this, and more.

I loved you in the morning
and most of the night,
I loved you, as the men of God
would say I had no right.
And in the empty places,
On broken barren fields,
I loved you 'til the spring came
And the earth began to yield.

I want you now in silence,
I want you in my hands,
I want you still, I swear to you,
as much as I did then.
So come to me in fever,
Come to me in flood,
Where all is heat and holiness,
And magic meets the mud.

It will be a kind of heaven
but one of our own choosing,
When your soul is ripe for saving
and your body ripe for bruising.

Meet me outisde of Eden,
Bring all your sense of sin,
And I can taste your longing
as it lies against your skin.
The garden we are growing
is in the center of the town,
Where I will be your resting place
and burn you to the ground.

-- Kat Eggleston


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Yes, David, it sounds like Kat is well aware of Leonard and may be styling herself, in her own fashion, after him. At any rate, I like her song very much. At some point, I'll probably buy this album. I have a couple others on my list ahead of it.

If you ever come by here again, David, I would just like to thank you for mentioning Kat Eggleston here. I listened to the album you mentioned, and I like it very much. She not only writes beautiful songs, but is a very good traditional folk singer, and has a quirky sense of humour. Her song "There's Too Much Sh** in my Purse" spoke to me particularly. Her work is only available as an import over here, so I shall look forward to sampling a few more of her CDs when I visit Florida later this summer.