This song is from Suzanne Vega's one-person show about the author Carson McCullers. It's a retelling of the plot from her story "The Ballad of the Sad Cafe."
The basic plot is about a woman, Amelia, who marries the wrong man. He almost ruins her life, but she chases him off (with violence). For a while, she is happy with a new man. But then the first one comes back to finish the job (with violence). What made it worse was that the new man helps him.
Framing this story, Vega expresses that his is a very Southern story: "On any Southern afternoon... a face appears inside a house." The face is described as being "terrible... sexless... white... and dim."
It's the face of Amelia, "waiting by the window... sitting by the shutter/ Remembering the laughing/ In he cafe down below."
It makes sense that her face would bear a "terrible" look, if she is remembering the brief good times with the second man. After all, was it all a lie, if he could turn on her with so little provocation, and to aid the man who wanted to hurt her at that?
Why exactly this story is so Southern, I am not sure. It does smack of Tennessee Williams.
Maybe the humidity makes everything sultry and torrid.
Next Song: Carson's Last Supper
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