We are all Danny Boy

Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
John Donne, “Meditation 17” (1624)

Of all the memorable moments in John McCain’s memorial service, none had more emotional power than Renee Fleming’s heartbreaking rendition of “Danny Boy.” (If you didn’t see it, you should. Click HERE)

McCain’s family, and those who knew and loved him, were moved to tears. But so were millions of others who never met the man, didn’t know or care much about his place in our nation’s history, or even flat disliked him.

Why?

I think the answer lies in a single word: empathy.

Deep ambiguities in the lyrics of “Danny Boy” lend a profound mystery to the song:

O Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen and down the mountainside
The summer’s gone and all the roses dying
It’s you, it’s you must go and I must bide

But come ye back when summer’s in the meadow
Or when the valley’s hushed and white with snow
‘Tis I’ll be here in sunshine or in shadow
O Danny boy, O Danny boy, I love you so

And when you come and all the flowers are dying
If I am dead, as dead I well may be
You’ll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an Ave there for me

And I shall hear, though soft your tread above me
And all my grave shall warmer, sweeter be
For you will bend and tell me that you love me
And I shall sleep in peace until you come to me

Who is Danny Boy? Who is singing the song? Are the pipes corporeal or heavenly? When the singer promises to meet Danny upon his return “in sunshine or in shadow,” does [s]he mean “rain or shine,” or that [s]he’ll be there, whether alive in the flesh (sunshine) or only in spirit (shadow)?

There are no final answers to these questions. While many listeners automatically assume that “Danny Boy” is a song of mourning, most interpreters believe that it is a message from an elderly parent to a son going off to war or an uprising. The death in question is not that of Danny Boy, but of the singer, who “well may be” dead upon Danny’s return. In that case, the pipes are true and proper bagpipes, not heavenly pipes calling Danny home to rest. And “in shadow” means only in shadow, having shuffled off the mortal coil.

But it doesn’t matter how we interpret the lyrics. We each use our own life experience to form our individual interpretations. And therein lies the universal power of the song to move us.

It moves us because it connects us with the devastation of separation, loss, and death, tempered only, for some, by the hope of reunion after death (“I shall sleep in peace until you come to me”).

Just as we all re-experience (or imagine) our own weddings when we attend a wedding, or think about our own death or the death, past or future, of a loved one when we go to a funeral, we are all haunted by the awful knowledge that one day the separation from those we love will be final.

Empathy is the ability to share the feelings of others. It doesn’t take an act of wild imagination to put ourselves in the shoes of others. It doesn’t take any imagination at all.

We are in the shoes of others. We have no choice. We are all mortal.

We are all Danny Boy.