You cant talk about this song without talking about the production of it on tour. It’s hella dramatic, references so many things, and is incredible to watch. I was first surprised she included this song on tour, but I think she really was visualizing this song and what tour would include.
Taylor starts off the song walking to a man – who walks away. It starts off pretty somber. She has a jacket on that gives marching band instructor vibes [definitely a leader in war] – lol – which is referential also to a commander in battle’s outfit. She walks back to the stage and gathers her war troops. There are drummers lined up in battle format.
One by one the troops fall and end in darkness – while Taylor falls to her knees and ends up completely on the ground as she has ‘died’ in battle.
Simply just the production is enough to give me chills, but she has many many references to Healy in this performance and she definitely didn’t hide who this is about.
If the lyrics weren’t enough to nail his coffin, her production references sure do. My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys also has a very similar vibe with the lyrics, and honestly because she is talking about toy soldiers she definitely could have mixed those two songs together for the tour, too.
So let’s dive into the most potent ‘fuck you’ song on the album
Lyrical Breakdown
Was any of it true?
Gazing at me starry-eyed
SO STARRY EYED. So many alone references in this that lead to other songs.. which I have to believe are tied to him. The first song immediately in my head.. again.. is high infidelity. But in this song – he is the one saving her.
Do I really have to chart the constellations in his eyes?
He is starry eyed just as he exists to her. The next reference is also some of the previous songs we have deciphered. Down Bad doesn’t say starry eyed, but she is referencing him being ‘in the sky’ as she looks up and wishes he would come back to her, Staring at the sky, come back and pick me up
What if I can’t have us. And last one I’ll reference, although there are plenty more on this album, is loml I thought I was better safe than starry-eyedI felt aglow like this. This idea of starry eyed, massive constellation love is repeated throughout Midnights, and TTPD.
In your Jehovah’s Witness suit
Who the fuck was that guy?
I mean, there is no needing to decipher this. He is the only one that she has been with who is constantly in a suit, on the streets and while he is performing.
Who the fuck was that guy? Meaning she was fooled. She didn’t know he was playing a role.
You tried to buy some pills
From a friend of friends of mine
They just ghosted you
Now you know what it feels like
Well this is some big information we didn’t know. Throughout this album there is references of drugs and chain smoking. I am definitely not saying with a full heart that Joe didn’t smoke or wasn’t on medication because I do think those things are true too. Most english men smoke.. it’s definitely a cultural thing [you can even get cigs at vending machines]. But from this line we get insight to drug use, and also that he ghosted her. He left her. She didn’t end it.
Now, we get that information throughout the album as well – so it isn’t necessarily new – but we assumed he just broke it off ‘he runs because he loves me,’ to protect her from ruining her image. But this is the first time thus far that we hear that he ghosted her. However we do get the lines, I’m so obsessed with him but he avoids me like the plague. So just some additional information – but the fact she’s releasing this somewhat private information is kinda.. a big.. fuck you lol
And I don’t even want you back, I just want to know
If rusting my sparkling summer was the goal
The summer of 2023 is literally her sparklingly summer. Eras tour 2023 – the beginning of being back into the concert cycle. Extravagant outfits – glitter everywhere, literally.
This line again is really asking, what was the point? Which we have heard in previous songs on this album. Was it to make her have to fake her happiness on a stage in front of thousands.. night after night?
And I don’t miss what we had, but could someone give
A message to the smallest man who ever lived?
What is the message Taylor??? I think it is the question of “what was the point.. what was your goal??” Because she still has no answers to that lingering question. I would say following her release of TTPD that she probably had even more questions, as he became engaged pretty quickly to someone else.
You hung me on your wall
Stabbed me with your push pins
I think about this line.. really often. This can be metaphoric but I also think quite literally. Taking polaroids, hanging them on the wall – but in the end covering her face with push pins and cropping her out – literally in the image, but also in life. Cutting her out, and stabbing her [metaphorically] where it hurts. Hanging things on our walls also somewhat glorifies them and idolizes them. So if we begin to cover up or take down those references on our wall – it is a sign.
In public, showed me off
He showed up to her concert in Nashville, publicly was singing her songs, they did this weird thing where they sang during their concerts and said ‘you know who you are, i love you’ while the other attended… He was around her all of spring and early summer- and it was the first time we saw her in public with a boi for a long time, since Joe seemed to always make her run through paparazzi or not at all. Like, the boy wasn’t even at her Doctorate award in NYC. -_-
Then sank in stoned oblivion
‘Cause once your queen had come
You treat her like an also-ran
He disappeared suddenly – and he idolized her [like the posters on his wall] and treated her as the way she hoped a lover would, but then treated her like a loser. I had to look up also-ran because never in my life have I used this term: a loser in a race or other contest, especially by a large margin.
You didn’t measure up
In any measure of a man
O.o oookayyyyyyy TAYYYY GET EM. lol He is relatively short, he didn’t keep his promises that he said to her.. and also is this a dick joke?
on to the most savage bridge ever
Were you sent by someone who wanted me dead?
Did you sleep with a gun underneath our bed?
So many questions here. Was this line made just for music? OR actually were they together for so long that he did sleep over so much that her bed was ‘our’ bed? The first line is also gut punching because she is basically saying this almost took her out. This was the most severe way to cut her – to mr. steal your girl and then make her cry – promise to save her from her sad lonely isolated love life, promise her cradles and marriage and then run and abandon her.
Were you writing a book? Were you a sleeper cell spy?
In fifty years, will all this be declassified?
Was he getting intel on her? A sleeper agent is a spy or operative who is placed in a target country or organization, not to undertake an immediate mission, but instead to act as a potential asset on short notice if activated. Was he trying to bring her up to tear her down slowly and surely? I think this is a great reference to how she executes this in tour. One by one her army is falling – until she does. It’s not an immediate death, but a slow burn. WHICH makes me think of High Infidelity… again,
You know there’s many different ways that you can kill the one you love
The slowest way is never loving them enough
Though these lines were about Joe – it shows her deepest pain and fear.
And you’ll confess why you did it
And I’ll say, “Good riddance”
‘Cause it wasn’t sexy once it wasn’t forbidden
Once she finds out she’ll be able to really close the door – BUT THE NEXT LINE MADE ME FALL OUT OF MY CHAIR BECAUSE MAROON.
For the longest time the fandom was convinced Maroon was a deeper shade of Red, meaning it was about Jake. But it wasn’t. The word maroon has many meanings. One is forbidden. The other is to be marooned, abandoned and left.
The burgundy on my T-shirt when you splashed your wine into me
And how the blood rushed into my cheeks, so scarlet, it was
The mark you saw on my collarbone, the rust that grew between telephones
The lips I used to call home, so scarlet, it was maroon
So scarlet it was maroon – means really, so forbidden it had to end.
Once she could actually be in the public with him, or she finally rid this idea of what she could or couldn’t do in public, it wasn’t fun to him any more. It wasn’t a ‘secret’ or high infidelity so it wasn’t fun.
I would’ve died for your sins
Instead, I just died inside
Again, a reference to religion in this album. She does this quite a bit in this album but she also did it in false god, so people freaking out from the metaphors in this album clearly didn’t listen to her other ones. With this line I also think about The One.
It would’ve been youIn my defense, I have none
For never leaving well enough alone
But it would’ve been fun
If you would’ve been the one
I know the One is also tied to the trifecta story she tells about Betty, Augustine, and James .. however I am also wondering if this is also a bit tied to her and this back and forth relationship. Re-listening to these albums is so wild with this new lens of continuation from 2012.
But hang on I’m not done – mostly the above lines make me think of I forgot that you existed
And I would’ve stuck around for ya
Would’ve fought the whole town, so yeah
Would’ve been right there, front row
Even if nobody came to your show
… could it be?
And you deserve prison, but you won’t get time
You’ll slide into inboxes and slip through the bars
The above two lines really just show how sneaky and snake like he is. Slithering his way out of consequences and using his connections to hide or free him.
You crashed my party and your rental car
You crashed my party makes sense to me, because he is ruining her sparkling summer, but your rental car? Something that isn’t owned, that isn’t permanent damage because it isn’t ours… When we ruin a rental car we have to pay a few fines, but it technically isn’t ours to fix. We pay the penalty and we move on without having to replace it or start again.
You said normal girls were boring
But you were gone by the morning
ouch. He said she was unique and different, and probably as weird as he is… her twin as she states in down bad, and references it in the music video of fortnight with her and austin having the same face tattoos that are covered up and hidden. Showing they are the same underneath.
But after he said those things, he left any ways.. so does that mean she’s just like the other girls in his past?
You kicked out the stage lights
But you’re still performing
This can be quite literally a reference of his performances – but also mixed with the idea of her saying he pretended to be something he isn’t, who the fuck was that guy? He ended the performances on stage but continued to be something he wasn’t with her. And clearly after he left.. he continued the performance of what is, and what was.
And in plain sight you hid
She does like.. hiding in plain sight, Dear Reader, but he hid from her in plain sight.
But you are what you did
LET’S TAKE A LOOK AT THE PAST. In her past – she was more forgiving, but it also wasn’t a romantic blow. in Innocent – her lyrics are
It’s okay, life is a tough crowd
32 and still growin’ up now
Who you are is not what you did
You’re still an innocent
But you are what you did
And I’ll forget you, but I’ll never forgive
The smallest man who ever lived
Ill forget you exist, but when I hear your name I’ll never forgive you.
The man who acted like a lion but was a coward – turned out to be a fake.
Just so many ties to other songs, it’s incredible
Visual Representation
I do like the black and white version but I feel like you really rid the detail of the faint screaming faces within the left face.
