Here is the line that raises the question of just who this female fan, or groupie, is

The letter has lifted the spirits of the artist, who has realized that he has indeed managed to make contact, most likely through his art, with one other person. upsetting her here in the sense of confronting her with thoughts that make her search her own psychological makeup and/or belief systems.

The telling point here is that we are not told that this female fan does not know him at all, but rather that any other female (or any other person?) could have known him better, and easily–apparently by familiarizing herself with more of his oeuvre and what stands behind it.

The fan has paid a left-handed compliment to the artist, acknowledging that he has upset her way of thinking, but adding that she does not wish him to go on probing her psyche through his art. that she wants him to remain just as he is, possibly because being able to pigeonhole the artist is easier than adjusting to the changing personae he azing how prophetic this line sounds, through a look back across Neil’s career, isn’t it?)

The most cryptic line in the song. I let her. what? Question her own being because of my art? Deal with my changing personae? Go on believing I would never change? Visit me in my dressing room? Dictate how my music would be played and my life lived? Or possibly even, I let her. where the artist was when the communique reached him. down; I let her know that I would indeed change. and I let her change, knowing that I would, too.

While she is apparently not someone who is intimately familiar with the singer in a multiplicity of ways, she apparently is familiar with one aspect of him, and (as we shall see) is unwilling to let go of that aspect in favor of others that he might possess

“In a while will the smile on my face turn to plaster, Stick around while the clown who is sick does the trick of disaster. For the race of my head and my face is moving much faster.”

Perhaps she has known him as a singer, a songwriter, an instrumentalist, even a lover, but in one way or another has not been willing or able to move past that one aspect to others, or to deal with his artistic change or growth

Here we are treated to an almost self-analytical look at the difference between the inner and outer parts of the singer’s life. Although the letter has managed to make the singer lifted and made happy (the smile), that smile must soon harden (notice this is not a question but a statement: the smile on my face will, in a while, turn to plaster) as he once again confronts his public with the pieces of his art that he has prepared for them, his outward and public side (face) competing with the demons inside him (head) that make him productive and his art meaningful–the clown who is sick referring to the tortured mental state of the productive artist and his changing conceptions of beauty and truth; the trick of disaster referring to the amazing ability to make that supreme jump from one mind to another through the artistic connection of production and presentation–and that competition between the public person and the artistic talent becoming ever more stretched and tense as the artist’s fame grows and his ability to express himself artistically blossoms.

With all this turmoil, and this ability to make others think, can I the artist legitimately afford to stand still?