Music For Places (AI)

 

Back in the 70s, songwriters wrote about cities: Phoenix, Wichita, Galveston. This lyric wasn't a riff on that--only the rhythm of the phrase "Hotel in Carlsbad". But Baltimore and Galveston are more interesting for a potential narrative--and are 3-syllable words. I like that it remains ambiguous and suggests that it's about the devastating hurricane in 1900 and the aftermath, but it really isn't--but could be by associating images with it.  

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When the rains returned
Cloud after cloud
I went back to the place 
Where the waves made a sound
The virga would fall
But I wouldn't hear a thing
I was welcomed to a world
Where the rains would begin

Hotel in Galveston
Far from African dust
A new atmosphere
Of American lust
Saw it in a noondream
Of America's bloom
It's embedded in a place
From the bust to the boom

A place tells a story
Not erased by time
It's in your hand
In the feel of a rhyme

Copyright 2026 Lee Barry. Lyric rights reserved