The album Bookends represents a phenomenal piece of album creation in that the entire first side offers a set of separate and wildly differing songs that nevertheless trace the human existence from birth to death when taken together. A central theme of the relationships that we keep in each stage of our lives runs throughout and ties all the pieces together. Below are some extracts from the lyrics of those songs that paint this musical portrait.

Life begins: Bookends Theme

Childhood: Save the life of my Child

"Save the life of my child!"
Cried the desperate mother
"Oh, what’s become of the children?"
People askin’ each other.

When spotlight hit the boy
And the crowd began to cheer---he flew away.
Oh my grace, I’ve got no hiding place,
Oh my grace, I’ve got no hiding place,
Oh my grace...

Young adulthood: America

Let us be lovers; we’ll marry our fortunes together
I’ve got some real estate here in my bag
So we bought a pack of cigarettes and Mrs. Wagner Pies.
And walked of to look for America

Kathy I’m lost I said though I knew she was sleeping
I’m empty and aching and I don’t know why
Countin’ the cars on the New Jersey turnpike
They’ve all come to look for America.

Middle age: Overs

Why don’t we stop fooling ourselves
The game is over, over, over.
No good times, no bad times,
There’s no times at all---just the New York Times

We might as well be apart
It hardly matters we sleep separately
Drop a smile
Cause we laughed d them
And we laughed them all in a very short time.

Aging: Voices of Old People

"I’ve got little in this world. I’d give honestly one hundred dollars for that picture..."
"God forgive me, but an old person without money is pathetic."
"Children and mother’s...That is mother’s life, to live for your child!"
"I couldn’t get younger. I have to be an old man, that’s all..."
"You could say, yes, an eyesore. And I was so happy and everybody was ‘what is this?’ ‘what is here?’ This is just---beautiful ...Your own room and your own home."

Old age: Old Friends

Old friends,
Old friends
Sat on their park bench like bookends.
A newspaper blown through the grass
Falls on the round toes
Of the high shoes of the old friends.
Old friends,
Winter companions, the old men---
Lost in their overcoats waiting for the sunset...
Can you imagine us years from today,
Sharing a park bench quietly?
How terribly strange to be seventy.
Old friends.

End of life: Bookend Theme

During the creation of the Bridge Over Troubled Water album, Art Garfunkel accepted a role in the screen adaptation of Joseph Heller’s Catch 22. For this part, he had to travel down to Mexico for filming. This move frustrated Paul Simon who wanted to focus on the album, and many blame this incident as one of the principle causes of the duo’s break-up. In looking at the lyrics of the album, one can see that several of the songs reflect this period as Paul was in New York and Art away in Mexico...

From So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright:

So long, Frank Lloyd Wright.
I can’t believe your song is gone so soon.
I barely learned the tune.
So soon.
So soon.
I’ll remember Frank Lloyd Wright,
All of the nights we’d harmonize till dawn.
I never laughed so long.
So long.
So long.

This is the first definite reference to Art Garfunkel and his trip on the album. Frank Lloyd Wright was a famous architect and, because Art studied architecture in college, becomes a symbol of him in this song. Thus, Paul seems sad that Art is gone "so soon" before he had barely "learned the tune". One could imagine that this indicates a feeling that Art had left things unfinished. That he longingly remembers "all the nights we’d harmonize till dawn" would hint that Paul wanted thingsback the way they were.

From The Only Living Boy in New York:

Tom, get your plane right on time.
I know your part’ll go fine.
Fly down to Mexico.
Da-n-da-da-n-da-n-da-da and here I am,
The only living boy in New York.

This is a very direct reference to the event. Tom was the name used by Art Garfunkel during the duo’s high school performance days as Tom and Jerry. The lyric mentions his part in the movie and his trip to Mexico. Paul also refers to himself as "the only living boy in New York" which may or may not be a veiled reference to his irritation at being left to work on the Bridgeproject alone.

From Why Don’t You Write Me:

Why don’t you write me
I’m out in the jungle,
I’m hungry to hear you....
Mail it today
If it’s only to say
That you’re leaving me.

If this is also a reference to Art’s trip, that fact is not as clear as the other songs on the album. However, the theme of loneliness and being left on one’s own does seem to carry through here. Indeed, the line "if it’s only to say that you’re leaving me" could be taken as signifying a worry about the direction in which their partnership was heading.