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April 15, 2020

Norah Jones has released “How I Weep,” the poetic opening track of her forthcoming album Pick Me Up Off The Floor, which will be released June 12. The new song follows the album’s lead single “I’m Alive,” a collaboration with Jeff Tweedy. Pick Me Up Off The Floor is available for pre-order on vinyl, CD, or download. Norah has been posting a series of #StayAtHome videos over recent weeks including a poignant live version of Guns N’ Roses’ “Patience” and a tribute to John Prine with a version of “That’s The Way The World Goes Round.”

Jones recently began writing her own poetry apart from music for the first time in her life. Eventually, several of those poems found their way back into songs on the new album, including “How I Weep,” where the singer mourns an untold loss over pensive piano and humming strings.

“My friend got me into poetry this year,” says Jones. “Her poetry, then she gave me poetry books. That plus reading Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein to my kids every night got me into a word maze and I wrote this poem. I liked it but doubted I would ever release a book of poems and started thinking how to turn it into a song. I edited it down quite a bit and sat with it and a very different kind of song emerged. I immediately thought of this string duo I saw to do an arrangement and I loved how it turned out as if they played the main role of the subject, or the ‘loss’.”

 

How I Weep

 

How I

How I

Weep for the loss

And it creeps down my chin

For the heart and the hair

And the skin and the air

That swirls itself around the bare

How I weep

How I weep

How I weep and I sleep

And I march and I dance

And I sing and I laugh and I laugh

And I laugh

But inside

But inside

Inside I weep

Inside I weep and I weep

For a loss

That’s so deep

That it hardens and turns into stone

 

There it stays

And rolls through bones

Till they crumble

And the earth doesn’t spin

It’s got no way to win

And the stars stare down with sad clown faces

And they taunt me

They taunt me

So I run and I run and I run and I run

But I’ve nowhere to go except into the sun

 

And I weep for the loss and the loss weeps for me

The loss weeps for me

Then it whacks me straight into my stomach at night

It’s a hard blow to take with all of its might

It tries to be sorry it tries to be sweet then it runs out the door as if on two feet

And I stand there and wonder when will I be free

Then I realized I held it, it never held me

It had to hurt me to finally be gone

’Cus I made the mistake of dragging it on

And I wonder what kind of person am I

Who weeps for a loss but can’t tell it goodbye

 

How I

How I weep

How I weep

How I weep

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