The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us

The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us
By Sufjan Stevens
From Illinois

"The Predatory Wasp" is absolutely one of my favorite songs, and has been for years. It is from a conceptual album framed around Illinois, Now, unlike when I first heard it, I actually understand what the song is about. The song is from the perspective of an adult looking back on his experiences from summer camp, likely somewhat based in Stevens' own experience, as he has indicated. The speaker recalls his first experience with queer love as a young boy. A young boy's experience of falling in love with another boy is transformative and awakening, yet dangerous, and can end in heartbreak that can leave someone feeling broken for the rest of their life.

Stevens starts the song describing the speaker half asleep, suddenly reminded of their experience:

Oh, I am not quite sleeping

Oh, I am fast in bed

There on the wall in the bedroom creeping

I see a wasp with her wings outstretched

 The scene set by the opening is sleepy and suggests that the wasp may be a figment of the speaker's imagination. In an interesting set of lines, Stevens introduces the main story of the song:

North of Savanna we swim in the Palisades

I come out wearing my brother's red hat

There on his shoulder my best friend is bit seven times

He runs washing, his face in his hands

Each line in this stanza introduces a new facet to the meaning. Stevens did not grow up in Illinois, and did not attend summer camp there. Why he chose to include this setting, in an album called Illinois, is unclear from this song alone. The second line has a triple meaning: first, it is a small, innocent suggestion of the closeness between the speaker and his brother; second, it is likely a reference to a scene in Catcher in the Rye in which a girl wears her brother's red hunting cap in a carefree moment; third, the phrase "come out" might take on the second meaning of coming out of the closet. In the last lines, the speaker's friend is bit by the wasp on his shoulder, yet he runs with his face in his hands. The image of holding one's face in one's hands is one of shame, fear, and embarrassment, not usually of pain. The reason for this embarrassment is explained more in the next stanza, where the speaker laments,

Oh how I meant to tease him

Oh how I meant no harm

Touching his back with my hand I kiss him

I see the wasp on the length of my arm

The meaning of the wasp becomes clear here: it is the speaker. More specifically, it is the perception of the speaker's sexuality as, like in the title, predatory. The description of the speaker's love interest as a "friend" is deliberately referencing the idea often instilled by adults into the minds of children that a queer child is predatory toward their friends of the same sex. The sting of the wasp here is both the speaker's kiss and the reaction of society to that kiss.

The next section of the song consists of the lines "We were in love, we were in love / Palisades, palisades / I can wait, I can wait" repeated over and over, each time with a different line sung beneath it, each ending with "hallelujah." These lines are cryptic, and fit together: "Trail of Tears and Horseshoe Lake," "Trusting things beyond mistake," "Lamb of God we sound the horn," "Unto us your ghost is born." The first line references two more locations in Illinois, perhaps adding to the majestic and nostalgic sense of the song. The second line is interesting, because it is unclear what the "things" the speaker mentions are—perhaps just the way things are with his friend. The last two lines are both very Christian, the second referencing the Holy Trinity.  They seem to be exclamations, relating the speaker's experience with his religion.

After the "chorus" (the song has a very irregular pattern), comes another interesting set of lyrics:

I can't explain the state that I'm in

The state of my heart, he was my best friend

Into the car, from the back seat

Oh, admiration in falling asleep

All of my powers, day after day

I can tell you, we swaggered and swayed

The first two lines are reference the speaker's current, complicated emotions for his friend that he still has years later. The next four could be interpreted several ways, and seem to shift between time. "Into the car" may suggest a sexual relationship between the speaker and his friend, referencing the cliche of teenagers hooking up in the backseat of a car. The next line brings the speaker back to the present, where he is reminiscing, half asleep. Then the speaker mentions "All of [his] powers." The phrase "all of my powers" is often used when someone is mentioning their failure, despite using "all their powers" to accomplish their goals. The last line here may again suggest a sexual relationship, or maybe just an image of innocent male youth.