Ain't No Cure for Love – English Lyrics

• By: Leonard Cohen
• Album: ImYourMan

Lyrics & Translation

Embark on a linguistic journey with Leonard Cohen's "Ain't No Cure for Love," a song that beautifully articulates the enduring and inescapable nature of human affection. Through its rich, poetic lyrics and Cohen's signature deep, resonant voice, you can explore sophisticated English vocabulary related to emotion, longing, and spiritual contemplation. The song's unique blend of vulnerability and profound insight offers an excellent opportunity to understand nuanced expressions of love and human experience in English.

[English]

I loved you for a long, long time

I know this love is real

It don't matter, how it all went wrong

That don't change the way I feel

And I can't believe that time is

Gonna heal this wound that I'm speaking of

There ain't no cure

There ain't no cure

There ain't no cure for love

I'm aching for you baby

I can't pretend I'm not

I need to see you naked

In your body and your thought

I've got you like a habit

And I'll never get enough

There ain't no cure

There ain't no cure

There ain't no cure for love

There ain't no cure for love

There ain't no cure for love

All the rocket ships are climbing through the sky

The holy books are open wide

The doctors working day and night

But they'll never ever find that cure for love

...

There ain't no drink no drug

(Ah tell them, angels)

There's nothing pure enough to be a cure for love

I see you in the subway and I see you on the bus

I see you lying down with me, I see you waking up

I see your hand, I see your hair

Your bracelets and your brush

And I call to you, I call to you

But I don't call soft enough

...

There ain't no cure

There ain't no cure

There ain't no cure for love

I walked into this empty church I had no place else to go

When the sweetest voice I ever heard, whispered to my soul

I don't need to be forgiven for loving you so much

It's written in the scriptures

It's written there in blood

I even heard the angels declare it from above

There ain't no cure,

There ain't no cure,

There ain't no cure for love

There ain't no cure for love

There ain't no cure for love

All the rocket ships are climbing through the sky

The holy books are open wide

The doctors working day and night

But they'll never ever find that cure (cure for love)

That cure for love

(No cure for love)

(There ain't no cure for love)

(No cure for love, there ain't no cure for love)

...

Key Grammar Structures

• I loved you for a long, long time

  ➔ Past Perfect Tense

  ➔ The phrase uses the Past Perfect Tense with 'had' implied, indicating an action completed before another past action. Here, 'loved' shows a prolonged action in the past.

• It don't matter, how it all went wrong

  ➔ Subject-Verb Agreement (Non-standard)

  ➔ The sentence uses a non-standard contraction 'don't' with a singular subject 'It', common in poetic or informal contexts for emphasis.

• There ain't no cure for love

  ➔ Double Negative (Non-standard)

  ➔ The phrase uses a double negative 'ain't no', which is non-standard but common in colloquial or poetic language for emphasis.

• I need to see you naked in your body and your thought

  ➔ Infinitive of Purpose

  ➔ The phrase uses the infinitive 'to see' to express purpose, indicating the reason for the action.

• All the rocket ships are climbing through the sky

  ➔ Present Continuous Tense

  ➔ The sentence uses the Present Continuous Tense with 'are climbing' to describe an action happening now.

• But they'll never ever find that cure for love

  ➔ Modal Verb for Future Negation

  ➔ The phrase uses the modal verb 'will' with 'never' to express strong negation in the future.

• I see you in the subway and I see you on the bus

  ➔ Conjunction for Parallel Actions

  ➔ The sentence uses the conjunction 'and' to connect two parallel actions, emphasizing repetition.

• It's written in the scriptures, it's written there in blood

  ➔ Passive Voice

  ➔ The phrase uses the Passive Voice 'is written' to emphasize the action rather than the doer.