Songfacts®:

• Beat Lawrence asked Justin Vernon of Bon Iver what the purpose of "Re" was in this song title. The singer-songwriter replied: "It's 'Regarding.' People use it in letters and emails. It's about pointing towards and idea, to amplify that 'This song is about the stacks.' I mean, every song title does that in a way, but I just really wanted to point it out: this song isn't the stacks, it's about the stacks."
• This song's first line is, "This my excavation and today is kumran," and Bon Iver's Myspace listed "the excavation at Kumran" as the album's sole musical influence.
  
  Drowned In Sound asked Justin Vernon what he meant by this. The singer-songwriter replied: "It's referring to the excavations where they found the Dead Sea Scrolls. When they found them it changed the whole course of Christianity, whether people wanted to know it or not. A lot of people chose to ignore it, a lot of people decided to run with it, and for many people it destroyed their faith, so I think I was just looking at it as a metaphor for whatever happens after that is new s--t."