Love of mine
Someday you will die
But I’ll be close behind
I’ll follow you into the dark
No blinding light
Or tunnels to gates of white
Just our hands clasped so tight
Waiting for the hint of a spark…

Have you ever read Michael Moorcock’s Elric saga? I’m not going to dive deep into those books right now, but there was always one line from The Sailor on the Seas of Fate that stuck with me for decades:

“Death is the promise we’re all born with, sir. A good death is better than a poor one.”

So that’s the reality. You, yes you, the one with the face, reading these words?

Someday you are going to die. And so will I. And everyone we’ve ever known and loved. There’s no dancing around that uncomfortable reality.

But bear with me, because today’s Buttkickin’ Halloween Songs installment is something a little more haunting but a lot more beautiful than anything we’ve featured this season.

I’m talking about I Will Follow You Into The Dark, from Death Cab for Cutie’s 2005 album Plans.

Revolving around a gently propulsive acoustic guitar and Ben Gibbard’s unadorned vocals, I Will Follow You Into The Dark is a simple, earnest recording. And it’s about death. Not the theatrical, supernatural kind that makes Halloween darkly fun, but the real freakin’ thing, man. The terrifying, inevitable mystery awaiting every living soul.

And yet it’s also one of the most deeply romantic songs I’ve ever heard. Gibbard doesn’t offer up any explanations for death, or comforting assurance of what comes afterwards.

Gibbard is simply saying this: “Whatever happens, wherever you go, I’m coming with you.”

You could pick this up as an act of selfless devotion, or see it as a desperate, aching fear of being separated from the person you love.

Love is what gives us the courage to face those fears. The lyrics remind us that, despite dogmatic practices, Fear is not at the heart of love. It’s the opposite. Love is at the heart of fear. Love is the destroyer of fear.

I love how there’s absolutely no certainty here in the song. No promise of pearly gates, heavenly reunions, or a benevolent universe waiting to reward us for our devotion. There may be nothing at all. But the promise remains.

Gibbard assures that wherever that darkness leads, he can’t imagine letting someone face it alone.

That’s what makes I Will Follow You into The Dark so haunting and lovely. It’s the extraordinary tenderness of someone looking directly into the infinite uncertainty and answering it with love.

It makes you want to question yourself about the greatest unknown of all and see if you’ll recoil from it or drift selflessly into it.

Whatever that journey is, maybe we don’t have to face it alone. Yoko Ono told John Lennon that you take nothing but your soul when you die. And I think in this life, if we’re damned lucky, we’ve had enough people beside us, and been beside enough people in turn, to leave our soul feeling worthwhile, fulfilled, and loved.

And maybe we take all of that with us into the dark.

If heaven and hell decide
That they both are satisfied
Illuminate the No’s on their Vacancy signs
If there’s no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I’ll follow you into the dark…