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- O dear Leonard Cohen
- Will you lend your voice and words
- To the loss we're feeling
- Because all we can do now
- Is cry
- Cry, cry, cry
- All we can do is cry
- Cry like we was babies
- Cry like we was lost
- Cry like we don't know when we're going home, AB
- Cry like we don't know when we're going home, baby
- Cry like we just don't know
- Oh, what a game this is
- The very game that makes me live
- Is the very game that makes me die
- The very game that makes me high
- The very game that makes me die
- Oh, what a game this is
- The crying game
- I cried like a Pup
- I cried like a captain
- I cried with AB de Villiers
- I cried with Michael Clarke
- I cried with my heart ripped bare
- I cried for a player I scarcely knew
- His childhood photographs on my bedside table
- And I saw him growing up
- And I saw him going up
- I saw him fall
- I saw us all fall
- I saw that kid from the country
- His farmer ways
- I saw him with Warner
- I saw him on the scoreboard
- Forever not out
- Forever, 63* not out
- I saw Morne long legs run down at the Kotla
- I saw Morne scissor balls back down at third man
- How he made the ball rise on such a passive pitch
- How he made the ball rise on just any pitch
- "How the moon hits your eye
- And the zing bails fly
- That's a Morne"
- I saw Morne as a boy going to school
- The gentle gawky kid that wouldn't hurt a fly
- The gentle gawky kid that wouldn't tell a lie
- Such a good kid, such a straight good kid
- And that kid sits on the banks of Eden Park
- In a pool of tears, in a pool of blood, sweat and years
- Morne Morkel, just sits there and weeps
- All six foot four inches of him just sits there and weeps
- That's a Morne
- "When the moon hits your eye
- Like a big pizza pie, that's amore"
- Oh, what a game this is...
- The very game that makes me live
- Is the very game that makes me die
- The very game that makes me high
- The very game that makes me die
- Oh, what a game this is
- The crying game
- AB was everywhere, every fucking where
- From mid off to mid wicket
- From a midsummer night's dream to a midlife crisis
- AB batted in the 40th, AB bowled in the 40th
- AB aged nine years, he was on to his 40th
- AB says
- I don't know what to do, I am completely at a loss
- AB says
- I don't know, I don't even know when we are going home
- AB says
- I tried my best to catch it, I didn't
- AB says
- As a captain, I'll be there for the guys
- AB says
- But life moves on and the sun will come up tomorrow
- AB says
- AB sobs
- I write to my South African friends
- I ask them the same question
- How are you?
- Antoinette Muller says
- "Oh I'm fine. They did their best."
- Sean Wilson says
- "I'm okay. It's just sport."
- Sean Simpson says
- "I am shattered. Drinking nice wine though."
- Ben Karpinski says
- "Not well mate. Really not well
- But hoping your boys can beat Australia on Thursday. That will help things"
- The very game that makes me live
- Is the very game that makes me die
- The very game that makes me high
- The very game that makes me die
- Oh, what a game this is
- The crying game
- Before AB cried, the skies wept.
Credits, notes, asides:
"That's Amore" - by Dean Martin (lyrics by Brooks, Jack / Warren, Harry).
"That's a Morne" - by Sean Wilson (@SimplySean on twitter).
It's only after writing this that I discovered that Morne Morkel and I share a birthday. We did not go to the same school, however.
For a lark, picture Leonard Cohen singing "Now so long, Morne, it's time that we began to laugh and cry and cry and laugh about it all again".
First published in daily O
