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Poor Edward

Apropos of pretty much nothing, I'm sitting here listening to Tom Waits CD "Alice". It has this great song called Poor Edward, the lyrics of which go like this.

Did you hear the news about Edward?
On the back of his head
He had another Face
Was it a woman's face
Or a young girl
They said to remove it would kill him
So poor Edward was doomed

The Face could laugh and cry
It was his Devil twin
And at night she spoke to him
Of things heard only in Hell
They were impossible to separate
Chained together for life

Finally the bell tolled his doom
He took a suite of rooms
And hung himself and her
From the balcony irons
Some still believe he was freed from her
But I knew her too well
I say she drove him to suicide
And took Poor Edward to Hell.

Very spooky! And fascinating. The two sided personality, good and evil co-existing in the one person. More fascinating - Mr Waits (or the song's narrator) sets you up to think that the sonmg is about Edward, but then at the end he says "I knew her too well". Your evil twin also has friends, or at least associates.

Isn't that us all over. Our evil twins drive us on. We can't be seperated from them, because it will kill us - they are us. They whisper in our ears at night. We hate them, but we have to learn to live with them. In the end, will we be free of them, or will we allow them to drag us down to hell?

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