taylor when she almost fell off the folklore cabin

They whisper in the hallway 'she's a bad bad girl' -> You know I'm not a bad girl -> I got that good girl faith -> Good girl, sad boy -> I think I've been too good of a girl

Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince (Lover) - So It Goes... (reputation) - Style (1989) - Question...? (Midnights) - Bejeweled (Midnights)

this means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things and is solely because i'm a word nerd but the lyric in the manuscript is the only time taylor actually says the word "sex" in her entire discography

No because people don’t seem to understand. The scrambled letters, the Easter eggs, the hidden letters and messages, these are all tradition for us. No it’s not just promo, she’s doing this for us, we’ve been doing this from the beginning of her career.

We started by figuring out hidden messages in songs from her booklets to connecting barcodes all across the globe. I’m so excited, I’m so happy.

when taylor says at the end "it wasn't a love affair" is she saying she wasn't in love with matty after all but instead she was having a mental breakdown?

basically, yes (it's more complicated than this, though).

essentially, what she's saying in the epilogue, which the album reflects, is that her relationship was dying and she was miserable about it. nothing she did to fix it was working. he wasn't doing anything at all. and she couldn't face the story of this thing that they believed was magical, heaven-sent, fated in the stars was ending in the most normal way. so she found an alternate route out - she (with his help) invented a new story, of something else that was magical, heaven-sent, fated in the stars, that she had to chase. and as the relationship devolved, it broke her brain, to try to deal with the pain and the realization of ending that magic, even though it wasn't magic anymore, and so the other thing became stronger, and she decided she had to chase it. the pressures of fame intensified this - she was scared of what people would say, she was scared of what people might think of her, it set off all these old hurts about being a maneater and what not - and imo so did the pressure and stress of tour and returning to the spotlight. but she did chase it, and she doubled down. and the more she did, the more manic she felt. but the reality didn't measure up to the fantasy, he broke every promise he'd made (because they were never real) and then ran for reasons she still doesn't understand, and she had to pick up the pieces.

being naked as a low key theme across the album in conjunction with the photo she chose as the cover - closed but open, sexy but guarded - is soo

‘CAUSE I’M A REAL TOUGH KID I CAN HANDLE MY SHIT THEY SAID BABE YOU GOTTA FAKE IT TIL YOU MAKE IT AND I DID LIGHTS CAMERA BITCH SMILE EVEN WHEN YOU WANNA DIE

taylor should post the paste review with 🤍i’d rather burn my life down than listen to one more second of all this bitchin and moanin🤍

so what i gathered from ttpd is that he didn’t actually let her bejeweled

“say it once again with feeling, how the death rattle breathing, silenced as the soul was leaving, the deflation of our dreaming, leaving me bereft and reeling, my beloved ghost and me, sitting in a tree, D-Y-I-N-G”

these lyrics kill me. death rattle breathing as in when you’re coughing and tryna fight your last moments, but it’s silenced because no matter how much you try to fight, death is on the edge and the soul is gonna leave. also, the meaning that it’s a silent death, nothing is said as you’re leaving, but you know you’re the end. and along with their relationship, all her dreams of their future died, and she’s just feeling empty and cold and her brain can’t conceive that this happened.

and ofc then we have the play on the nursery rhyme with the lyrics “[name] and [name] sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G,” but instead it’s her and the ghost of her absent partner (who she still loves) sitting in a tree, and they’re dying. heart-wrenching.

I can't explain it but the production in i can fix him (no really i can) sounds like this

I LOVE ARM

There's something to be said for girlhood being lost and taken so young (the manuscript) and boyhood being clung to until the end of forever (Peter)

is this the end of all the endings? … come one come all it’s happening again… hand on the throttle thought i caught lightning in a bottle oh but it’s gone again… how did it end? ……… he’s got my heartbeat skipping down sixteenth avenue… i can’t find a pulse my heart won’t start anymore for you… stopped CPR after all it’s no use….. clearing the air i breathed in the smoke… six weeks of breathing clean air i still miss the smoke……. i want to teach you how forever feels… you and me forevermore… he saw forever so he smashed it up…….. your integrity makes me seem small you paint dreamscapes on the wall… when your impressionist paintings of heaven turned out to be fakes well you took me to hell too………. but i’m a fire and i’ll keep your brittle heart warm if your cascade ocean wave blues come… don’t want no other shade of blue but you… you sacrificed us to the gods of your bluest days……… all’s well that ends well to end up with you… and i’ll still see it until i die you’re the loss of my life…………….

get it in, loser, we’re going to the psych ward

i find the criticism of taylor using modern day language or slang in her lyrics prohibiting her music from being truly timeless to be really superficial. like timeless doesn't necessarily mean that it has to sound like it was created at any moment in time. it means that it can withstand the test of time. there is endless art that makes specific references to things that were only applicable to the time period they were in because like. that's what art is!!!! if the overall piece is good and relatable and moving, it'll still be so in fifty years.