I Wish I Were Blind – Bruce Springsteen

Posted on October 21, 2026 by observationblogger — Leave a comment

Bruce Springsteen’s 1992 dual-album releases Human Touch and Lucky Town contain some of his most beautiful and touching ballads, yet much of the music has been overlooked over the years. I’ve tried to bring some of these gems to light, as I consider the albums home to some of his most remarkable and introspective writing.

As I have maintained in other song posts, there are at least ten songs from both albums that could have been combined to form one classic Springsteen album, perhaps rivalling his very best. I think today’s featured track, I Wish I Were Blind, would be a worthy inclusion on that shortened list.

Can you believe I had somehow let this one fall through the cracks over the years? I feel fortunate to have been reunited with it recently while researching his other songs. Phew, too, because as soon as I heard it again, I could remember every line and was jolted back to my late teens, singing it as I had done all those years ago, when my music collection was still blossoming.

I’m not exaggerating when I say it felt as though a piece of my youth had been reattached, making me feel a little more whole again. I know that sounds pretty deep and raw, but so is the song. There are few other Springsteen songs like I Wish I Were Blind in which he so poetically and tenderly expresses the pain of being burnt by love through such vivid, nature-inspired imagery. I love to see the cottonwood blossom in the early spring – I love to see the message of love that the bluebird brings.

That is an innocent and impassioned side of Springsteen we don’t often see. You can feel the aching in his words as he reflects on what could have been, what he is sorely missing, and how it has left him broken inside. Most people can probably relate to having once been so in love with that special someone, only to find they have left you for another person.

I recalled my own scarred experience of lost love in my previous post about the dual album, With Every Wish:

I was madly in love with – my first ‘proper’ love – a Yorkshire lass called Louise. This song, in that sense, has always been the one that rekindles everything we had together, even if it was cut short when she eventually went home to England.

Today’s song is like Part 2 of that story because, not long after returning to England, Louise married another man. I was heartbroken, and the emotional scars from that experience have never completely healed despite all the decades that have passed. You don’t get over that stuff – you just learn to deal with it.

I think Springsteen captures that affliction as tellingly and unflinchingly as I can recall any other music artist doing. There are few more touching moments in song than when he sings, And though this world is filled with the grace and beauty of God’s hand. I become an emotional wreck at that point.

Also, a big shout-out to his spectacular, wailing guitar solo, which feels like a cry of anguish, bringing all that hurt and pain bubbling to the surface and exposing it in its most primal state. It’s a work of wonder. I think I Wish I Were Blind is right up there with some of his most stirring, raw and emotional love songs. It’s just so beautifully written, both lyrically and musically.

This was one heck of a big fish in that brimming Springsteen pond that nearly got away.

[Verse 1]
I love to see the cottonwood blossom in the early spring
I love to see the message of love that the bluebird brings
But when I see you walkin’ with him down along the strand
I wish I were blind when I see you with your man

[Verse 2]
I love to see your hair shining in the long summer’s light
I love to watch the stars fill the sky on a summer night
The music plays, you take his hand, I watch how you touch him as you start to dance
And I wish I were blind when I see you with your man

[Chorus]
We struggle here but all our love’s in vain
Oh, these eyes that once filled me with your beauty now fill me with pain
And the light that once entered here is banished from me
Oh, and this darkness is all, baby, that my heart sees
And though this world is filled with the grace and beauty of God’s hand
Oh, I wish I were blind when I see you with your man

[Outro]
Oh, I wish I were blind when I see you with your man
Oh, I wish I were blind when I see you with your man

References:
1. Human Touch – Wikipedia