Album: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere (1969)

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• Hello, cowgirl in the sand (hello, cowgirl in the sand)
  Is this place at your command?
  Can I stay here for a while?
  Can I see your sweet, sweet smile?
  
  Old enough now to change your name
  When so many love you is it the same?
  It's the woman in you that makes you want to play this game
  
  Hello, ruby in the dust (hello, ruby in the dust)
  Has your band begun to rust?
  After all the sin we had
  I was hopin' that we'd turn bad
  
  Old enough no, to change your name
  When so many love you is it the same?
  It's the woman in you that makes you want to play this game
  
  Hello, woman of my dreams (hello, woman of my dreams)
  Is this not the way it seems?
  Purple words on a gray background
  To be a woman and to be turned down
  
  Old enough now to change your name
  When so many love you is it the same?
  It's the woman in you that makes you want to play this game Writer/s: Neil Young
  Publisher: Hipgnosis Songs Group, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
  Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

Comments: 8

• Winston Ono from Texas, Dammit!Yer all wrong (mostly)! Despite being written in 1969 (when I was eight), “Cowgirl in the Sand” is about me and my ex.
  
  We met in 1978, taking a college course while still in high school. “Cowgirl in the sand” refers to my ex, who was from Utah, i.e., “out west” and sandy. She was was six months older than me, a year ahead in school, and tended to take charge, hence “Is this place at your command?” I was always trying to make time to see her, which became more difficult when her family moved out to the woods, so that's “Can I see your sweet sweet smile.” And she did have a sweet smile: her lips would part a little at the sides but stay together in the middle. As others have observed about “Old enough now to change your name,” my ex thought she was old enough to get married, and she previously had an unofficial fiancé in Utah. “When so many love you is it the same?” refers to the previous fiancé and me and after my ex’s family returned to Utah she began dating others and eventually married somebody else. “It’s the woman in you that makes you want to play this game" is self-explanatory.
  
  “Hello ruby in the dust” combines two metaphors. The “ruby” is from Eshet khayil, a section of the Biblical Proverbs that begins: “A woman of valor who can find? For her price is far above rubies.” My ex and her husband have settled near the Texas-Oklahoma border—part of the Dust Bowl—so my ex is a “ruby in the dust.” “Has your band begun to rust?” refers to my ex's wedding ring, which is supposed to gold but may be showing signs of rust after forty-some years of marriage to the wrong guy. “After all the sin we've had/I was hopin' that we'd turn bad”—at the time of our romance, my ex and I were in our late teens and went at it like rabbits. However, she was very attached to her church and was concerned that our “sin” would prevent us having a church wedding. I, otoh, felt we just wouldn't tell the church and get married anyway.
  
  “Hello, woman of my dreams” is also self-explanatory. “Is this not the way it seems?” refers to my uncertainty over the fate of our relationship, how things can change so much after all those years and still not change at all, and which parts are real. I met a girl in college and we married after we graduated—the wedding invitations my bride chose had “Purple words on a grey background.” Finally, “To be a woman and to be turned down” is our current situation, in that I'm devoted to the woman I married, so even if my ex had changed her mind I would have to turn her down.
  
  I know I'm not reading things into Neil’s lyrics because it's happened to other people. The guy next door to me during my junior year was dumped by his girlfriend when he traveled to Hamburg and the lyrics to “Shock the Monkey” perfectly described his situation. And while in Hamburg he first heard the German version, “Schock den Affen.”
• BirdPurple words on a grey ground
  PURPLE HAZE.
• AnonymousI asked if Neil Young played and wrote each string part of the song Cow girl in the sand?
• Richie from Colorado Purple words on a gray background (unsure of this reference). But the next line is clear and unambiguous: to be a woman and to be turned down. The flower of youth fades, as does the ability to reproduce, her biological imperative expires. Be careful, oh desirable one, you have a time, and its short. The good men move on to more fertile fields.
• AnonymousHaving been a specific type of a girl in my day, and growing up with a grandpa who was a cowboy rode in Death Valley early 20th C, grew up on ranch in So. Cali, and myself growing up on the glorious beaches of LI- well, a I always thought this song was about me...a Cowgirl in the Sand! Neil Young gets it right, I think. To me, this is a song about the burdens of beauty. The betrayals. The missed or mixed signals that we all only get to figure out once with no going back. The let downs in love and sexual attraction.....the passage of time and how it wears is away back to dust, rust and particles of sand. Which are quite lovely under a microscope!
• Chris from ChicagoI think Joni Mitchell is the "Cowgirl in the Sand" (of California). Two of her many lovers were friends of Neil's--David Crosby, and Graham Nash. David was kicked to the curb quickly, but Graham and Joni lived together in her house for quite a while, but Joni did not marry him. "Is this place at your command? Can I stay here for a while? Can I see your sweet, sweet smile?" Clearly, Graham was in love, but Neil, speaking for Graham, acknowledges that she is in control of Graham's future, and she probably loves that control.
  "Old enough now to change her name" (she COULD get married), "When so many love you is it the same?" (after so many lovers is she too jaded to even be in love?), "It's the women in you that makes you want to play this game" (the game of leaving Graham hanging about the future of their relationship). Neil is chastising Joni for playing with his friend Graham's emotions.
• Inconspicuous from WisconsinYoung's 1968 introduction to Charlie Manson at Dennis Wilson's place on Sunset led to NOT ONLY an interest in Manson's music, but a slight fascination with his girls. In a recent (2015) interview with Howard Stern, Young admitted trying to get Manson a recording deal, but when queried about the women sounded disappointed saying, "the girls couldn't see past Charlie..." One girl in particular has repeatedly said she was the "cowgirl" when they'd 'act out' under the influence of LSD at Spahn's Ranch. I have no doubt she is the main inspiration for this song.
• George from Vancouver, CanadaThe lyrics seem to clearly point to it being one young woman (are you old enough to change your name); &, as for never having been to Spain - he could well have heard of Spanish beachers, or read of them, or seen photos. . . I take this at face value.

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