There never was a cake

OK. I know I am beating a dead horse here, but it is true that when something gets into my head I have a hard time letting it go until it is resolved, at least to my liking. Not that I have to agree with the results, don't get me wrong, it just has to resolve. On a recent four hour road-trip, the one that led up to the previous post, I spent a lot of quality time with my iPod. I had since transferred "a Tramp Shining" Side Two, and was listening to MacArthur Park on repeat (as Jim Morrison once said,"oh, don't ask why"). Again, I know this piece is long-winded to some and farsical to others and I do not mean to convert the inconvertible, but I do not believe there was any cake (in the literal sense) to begin with. We would have to ask Jimmy Webb and I do not know if he is alive or dead or if this topic has already been covered a million times or not. Anyway, Richard Harris is walking through this park (think of him in the trench coat in that old picture of James Dean for Boulevard of Broken Dreams). He is reflecting on a lost love whom he spent so much time with here. He thinks of spring, her yellow dress, and so on. His thoughts lead to tears which make his eyes glassy, creating the "fish-eyed lens of tear stained eyes" (Roger Waters, the Final Cut). The street lights "run", the scene blurs. "MacArthur's Park is melting in the dark" is literal, at least to his eyes. "all the sweet green icing" and "the cake out in the rain" are figurative statements as mentioned in the earlier post. Now, as a kid, when I heard him say, "I don't think I can take it," I didn't even know there was a cake involved, I never heard that. I thought he meant "I can't take it any more". This seems to align more closely than a hobo looking for free food and finding it in the form of a cake being battered by the elements.

In short, "I don't think I can take it (the pain anymore), Cuz' it took so long to bake it (the relationship), and I'll never have that recipe (for love) again".

Amen