So the Rachel Ries show Friday night was a lot of fun, though far shorter than I would have liked. There were highlights: despite forgetting to bring along her banjo, Ries soldiered on and performed on guitar one of my favorite of her songs, a simple but brilliant little song-poem about falling in love with a place. That place would be Valentine, NE, which sits on the Nebraska map like a trap–like an engraved invitation for someone to write a bad earnest or bad ironic song about it. Thank goodness, then, that in this case a greatly gifted songwriter took the bait. To wit:
Valentine, NE
Hey I found my home last night
On my way through Valentine.
Nebraska said, hey how you been,
Cause you’ve been gone for so long.
Hey how you been my sweet valentine?
Well, I’ve been in the concrete palace
Singing for rocks and dimes.
Wondering just how long I’d last
Living in the city on fire.
Hey how you been my sweet Valentine?
There’s a man down Chicago way
Thinking I’ll be home by suppertime.
But he’s no prairie, ain’t got no sky.
So goodbye my old valentine.
Hey I found my home last night
On my way through Valentine.
Nebraska said, hey how you been,
you’ve been gone for so long.
Hey how you been my sweet Valentine?
I love that the personification of the place in the first verse (“Nebraska said, hey how you been”) is mirrored in the third verse by the (unflattering) comparison of a person to a place. I love that she leaves this metaphor deliberately rough, likening apples to oranges without apology. And the understated way she juxtaposes valentine with Valentine in trading the man for the place.
But this song is better heard than read. You can listen to some of it at Amazon.