Carry Me Home

This song has me stumped, but here are some of my thoughts. First, what does it mean to be “raised in the nettles”? Perhaps the speaker and Jessie are from a small town in Ohio where there are lots of stinging nettles. We wonder whether Jessie, a “poisoned man,” was stung by stinging nettles or if some other poison is at work, perhaps a terminal illness like HIV/AIDS. What does a poisoned man come to know? Maybe that life is short and we should savor every happy moment.

The speaker tells us that she and Jessie have left Ohio. Perhaps they are going East to New York City — Brooklyn or Manhattan, which is where the band Hem is located. We learn that Jessie is “bleeding” on the valley floor. Nettles don’t cause bleeding, so we can rule out nettles as the cause of Jessie’s condition. Perhaps he has HIV with a weakened immune system or perhaps he is a hemophiliac, which explains excessive bleeding.

The there is the line, “I felt so dirty I could hardly stand it.” What makes the speaker feel so dirty when she’s carrying Jessie? Could Jessie be her lover? Maybe they’ve had dirty sex of some kind, and that’s why she feels dirty when she’s with Jessie.

Finally, who is the third person (“she said hold on”) who tells the speaker she knows she’ll bury Jessie? At this point, it doesn’t seem like Jessie has survived the move from Ohio to New York City. Maybe Jessie has died of HIV/AIDS, and now the speaker is preparing to bury his body and organize a funeral. The poison that has killed Jessie could also be something like terminal cancer.

As for the line, “I know you’ll carry me home,” I guess there is someone that will bring the speaker home, possibly from New York City back to Ohio.