You can see every baseball diamond in Iowa
From 37,000 feet
At night they’re all lit up like gems
At the edges of towns so neat
It’s the same in Illinois, Ohio, across the Midwest
Islands of people and dreams
Each town crowns a Corn King
Each crowns a Harvest Queen
The lives they live now and forever
Are deeply engraved in the land
The forests are gone now, the plains will be too
But for now they’re making a stand
On the Fourth of July the night landscape
Explodes with lights far below
And each town becomes a sparkled brooch
Alight with an urgent glow
Joni Mitchell sits in the front cabin
A couple of rows from you
She smiles when you send a note over
And asks you over to talk to her too
You said there were fireworks out the window
She said yes, she had seen them as well
She wrote Amelia after a flight on this route
It was a story she needed to tell
You asked her about This Flight Tonight
Did she like Nazareth’s cover?
You talked of fly-fishing in Wyoming,
Your heads close together like lovers
The lights of Toronto in the distance
In the dark, coming over the lake
Are both hopeful and depressing
You’re home, but it’s the same place
Ramp, arrivals, a smoke and a cab
And you’re back in your life once again
The hopes and the dreams and the baseball teams
Of the Midwest are remembered in vain
You can see every baseball diamond in Iowa
From 37,000 feet
At night they’re all lit up like gems
At the edges of towns so neat
Some great lines in this lyric. I love the melancholy. The diamonds, gem and brooch hold up as a consistent and arresting metaphor. I hope someone sets this to music.
Thanks, Elliot. This is my first comment. It's the best song I've written so far, but you should also check out Climbing Mount Popo In Boat Shoes and Almost There, both with some select imagery