Backwoods Barbie

Honoring Edgar and Dolly on their shared birthday

My annual paean to those illustrious co-nates, Dolly Parton and Edgar Allan Poe.

Backwoods Barbie

BY EDGAR ALLAN POE (RECORDED DURING A séance)

It was many and many a year ago,

In Sevierville, Tennessee

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of Backwoods Barbie;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to write songs and play them for me.

I was a child and she was a child,

In Sevierville, Tennessee

But we loved with a love that was more than love—

I and my Backwoods Barbie—

With a love that the high-haired sirens of Nashville

Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,

In Sevierville, Tennessee

A bedazzled Wagoner swooped down upon

My beautiful Backwoods Barbie;

Yea, sequined Porter and RCA came

And signed her away from me,

And forced her to sell countless boxes of Breeze

O’er in Nashville, Tennessee.

Those bastards, late of the Grand Ole Opry,

Went envying her and me—

Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,

In Sevierville, Tennessee)

That they signed her away to make records and films,

Displaying (well, and paying) my Backwoods Barbie.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we—

And actually far richer than we—

And neither the fact that she never writes back

Nor her membership in the Opry,

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

Of the beautiful Backwoods Barbie;

For my playlists don’t stream, without playing “Jolene”

By the beautiful Backwoods Barbie;

And my TV’s alive, with the great 9 to 5

Of the beautiful Backwoods Barbie;

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side

Of my darling—my darling—(inflatable) bride,

In our cabin in East Tennessee—

In Sevierville in East Tennessee.