Easter Eggs and Hidden Meanings in Taylor Swifts Songs

Let’s begin with Tay-Tay’s latest album, The Tortured Poet’s Department. Swifties may be able to list the men Taylor’s songs are about, but do you know which ex-flame inspired the name of her 2024 album? It was her ex-boyfriend of six years, actor and London boy Joe Alwyn.

The album name comes from Joe’s WhatsApp group chat, “The Tortured Man Club.” While The Tortured Man Club would be an apt name for Taylor’s throng of ex-boyfriends, it actually consists of Joe and his friends, actors Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal.

TTPD‘s opening track, “Fortnight,” featuring Post Malone, is about a brief encounter. If you’re unfamiliar with the word, it’s used more in the UK than in the States. Taylor must have picked it up from her many English boyfriends!

The Brits regularly use the word fortnight, originally meaning fourteen nights. Swiz sings, “And I love you, it’s ruining my life,” and “I touched you, for only a fortnight.” Though she first dated Matty Healy in 2014, the timing suggests it’s about their rekindled 2023 relationship.

Again from her 2024 album The Tortured Poet’s Department, track three, “My Boy Breaks All His Favorite Toys”, is rumored to be about troubled rock’ n’ roll bad boy and lead singer of The 1975, Matty Healy (pictured with DJ Nick Grimshaw).

In an interview with Amazon Music, Taylor explained that she was “somebody’s favorite toy until they break you and then don’t want to play with you anymore…” “Down Bad”, “I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)”, and “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived” are also diss tracks about Matty Healy… sorry we mean Peter!

On TTPD, Taylor sings about a boyfriend who “said you’d come and get me, but you were 25 … And the shelf life of those fantasies has expired.” Matty Healy was around 25 years old when the pair first dated in 2014.

Peter Pan was the boy who never grew up. Swift references “Peter losing Wendy” on 2020’s “Cardigan”. More lyrics read: “Lost to the ‘Lost Boys’ chapter of your life,” and “Forgive me, Peter / please know that I tried.”

Peter isn’t the only pseudonym Taylor uses for an ex. Swifties were baffled when the name William Bowery appeared in several songs. But then they worked out that William Bowery is an anonymous pseudonym used by Joe Alwyn to co-write songs on Folklore, Evermore, and Midnights — including “Exile”, “Betty”, “Champagne Problems”, “Coney Island”, “Evermore”, and “Sweet Nothing”.

Joe’s grandfather was a musician called William, while “Bowery” refers to the hotel where they first hung out, New York City’s Bowery Hotel.

In another song from her 2024 TTPD album, “The Alchemy”, Swift suggests that her past British boyfriends were just “blokes” who “warmed the benches” for Kansas City Chiefs Tight End Travis Kelce.

In addition to referring to their chemistry, the song uses several sports metaphors, like “So when I touch down / Call the amateurs and cut ’em from the team.” It seems that Taylor loves a tight end. Before Travis Kelce, the guy with the tightest end she dated was Tom Hiddleston, aka Marvel’s Loki.

Taylor compares her love story with Travis Kelce to a sweet high school romance. She sings: “Are you gonna marry, kiss or kill me?” / It’s just a game, but really I’m bettin’ on all three for us two.” But what does it all mean?

Well, in a viral throwback video, Kelsey once played “Kiss, Marry, Kill” featuring Taylor Swift, Katy Perry and Ariana Grande. He said he’d kiss Taylor, marry Katy, and kill Ariana! Maybe to get her revenge, she ends with a mic-drop: “You know how to ball, I know Aristotle.”

Speaking of Ancient Greece, Cassandra was a clairvoyant Trojan priestess who worshiped Apollo. The Greek god gave her the gift to see into the future, but there was a downside. No one would ever believe her prophecies. Taylor suggests she warned the public about one of her enemies — but that no one listened at the time.

She sings, “So, they killed Cassandra first ’cause she feared the worst,” she sings. “And tried to tell the town / So they filled my cell with snakes, I regret to say / Do you believe me now?”

And speaking of prophecies, on “The Prophecy”, Taylor begs the gods to grant her a new lover after a breakup… but from which boyfriend? The lyrics read, “I’ve been on my knees / Change the prophecy […] Don’t want money / Just someone who wants my company / Let it once be me.”

A “Karma” music video Easter Egg shows Taylor as a golden statue, nodding to “The Prophecy” lyrics: “But even statues crumble if they’re made to wait.” Since the video dropped in May 2023 — before she broke up with Matty — it must be about Joe Alwyn.

Similarly, “The Manuscript” could also be about one of two ex-boyfriends. The lyrics mention an age gap, so it could be Jake Gyllenhaal or John Mayer, as they are nine and 12 years her senior.

“In the age of him, she wished she was 30 / And made coffee every morning in a Frеnch press […] She thought about how he said since she was so wise beyond her years / Everything had been above board / She wasn’t sure.” She made “The Manuscript” short film while revisiting “All Too Well”, so it’s most likely about Gyllenhaal.

Taylor surprised Swifties by announcing on Twitter at 2 a.m., “I’d written so much tortured poetry in the past 2 years […] so here’s the second installment of TTPD: The Anthology… 15 extra songs.” Eagle-eyed fans will have spotted Kim Kardashian’s name in the title of “thanK you aIMee”.

Taylor sings, “And it wasn’t a fair fight, or a clean kill / Each time that Aimee stomped across my gravе,” referencing the infamous phone call between herself and her nemesis Kanye West that Kim posted online in 2016.

On another bonus track, Taylor sings about hoping an ex who forgot to turn off his phone’s location misses her. She sings, “I am someone who, until recent events / You shared your secrets with / And your location / You forgot to turn it off / And so I watch as you walk into some bar called The Black Dog / And pierce new holes in my heart.”

Now, while The Black Dog is a bar in Vauxhall, on the banks of London’s River Thames, it’s also a metaphor for depression — famously used by Winston Churchill.

TTPD’s final song is about a silent movie actress whose life and career suffered much scrutiny. Clara Bow clawed her way out of squalor to become the original “it girl.” But no matter how much the 1920s starlet partied and slept around to try to bury her pain, her haunting past always caught up with her.

Eventually, Clara suffered a tragic breakdown. Taylor sings, “It’s hell on earth to be heavenly […] Them’s the brakes, they don’t come gently.” In the same song, Tay-Tay also compares herself to Stevie Nicks.

Every Swiftie knows why Tay-Tay re-recorded her old albums, but in doing so, she also released some of her old songs. One re-released track was “Nothing New”, which she wrote in 2012 when she was 22 years old and already feeling she was old news in the music industry.

Many Swifties have speculated that by releasing this old song, she’s talking about feeling old and washed-up compared to younger stars like Billie Eilish and Olivia Rodrigo! Now in her mid-30s, she’s almost old enough to be their mom!

Ever since Taylor released “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together”, fans have speculated who the song is about. Well, it refers to American actor Jake Gyllenhaal. She even told USA Today, “I made a song that I knew would absolutely drive him crazy when he heard it on the radio.” But that’s not her only song about Gyllenhaal.

“I Bet You Think About Me”, “The Last Time,” “State of Grace”, and “Red” also describe their doomed romance, hinting at Jake’s snobby music taste, picking fights, and “twin fire signs, four blue eyes.”

In “All Too Well,” Taylor sings: “I left my scarf there at your sister’s house / And you’ve still got it in your drawer even now.” Later in the song, she sings: “But you keep my old scarf / From that very first week / Because it reminds you of innocence / And smells like me / You can’t get rid of it.”

Fans have speculated that the scarf is a metaphor for Taylor losing her innocence at Jake Gyllenhaal’s sister’s house when the pair took a road trip to upstate New York for Thanksgiving.

Everyone knows what year Swift was born — 1989 — but since she was born on December 13th, her favorite number is 13. The unlucky number pops up everywhere in her videos, from clock faces to background graffiti.

But 13 doesn’t just show up visually. “Call it What You Want” and “Our Song” both feature a 13-second intro. Taylor told Jay Leno, “I was born on the 13th, I turned 13 on Friday the 13th, my first album went gold in 13 weeks.”

One of Taylor’s most haunting and saddest Folklore songs is “My Tears Ricochet.” So, it’s got to be about a boy, right? Wrong! It’s about a business deal gone bad. The song is about Scott Borchetta, CEO of Big Machine Records, who discovered Taylor when she was 14.

In 2017, he sold her original master recordings to Scooter Braun, who discovered Justin Bieber. The poignant song reflects Taylor’s struggle and heartbreak at losing control of her music. She took back control by re-recording her albums.

Taylor perfectly exemplifies that Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned on “Mad Woman,” also from her eighth album, Folklore. The lyrics, “What did you think I’d say to that? Does a scorpion sting when fighting back? They strike to kill, and you know I will / You know I will,” refer to her ongoing spat with music executive Scooter Braun.

The line “What did you think I’d say to that?” refers to Braun offering Taylor to “earn one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in.”

While Taylor purged most of the Braun-Borchetta drama on her Folklore and Evermore albums, it was still at the forefront of her mind when she wrote Midnights (2022). On “Vigilante Sh*t”, our girl is back to her venomous best. Hip-hop Taylor returns to scowl, “I’m takin’ my time / Takin’ my time / ‘Cause you took everything from me.”

As Tay-Tay delivers her noirish revenge over a dark, bassy trap beat, she mentions someone telling the FBI about “white-collar crimes.” Plus, “While he was doin’ lines and crossin’ all of mine” is classic Swift wordplay.

Back in 2008, a fresh-faced Taylor met Joe Jonas supporting the Jonas Brothers on their Burnin’ Up Tour. They dated for three months, and then Joe dumped her on the phone. According to her songs “Mr. Perfectly Fine” and “Forever & Always,” Joe told Taylor he fell in love with her and had been waiting for her all of his life…

However, Swift told Ellen DeGeneres in 2008, “I’m not even gonna be able to remember the boy who broke up with me over the phone in 25 seconds when I was 18.”

Taylor has had more boyfriends than hot dinners. It was neck and neck, but yesterday, she had a salad for lunch! Amongst all those ex-flames, the King of her heart was Englishman Joe Alwyn, whom she dated for six years. In the song, she makes several Easter Egg references to America and Britain.

She refers to her being his American Queen, Motown beats, British Range Rover and Jaguar cars, and, of course, a king… which Britain has, but America hasn’t since 1776.

Taylor was happy with Joe Alwyn. In her 2017 bubblegum, electro-synth-pop anthem “Gorgeous”, she shouted from the rooftops of their $12 million North London house by the heath: “You make me so happy, it turns back to sad.”

But when the relationship was on the rocks, she wrote: “You’re Losing Me”, which was included on her 2022 Midnights album. Taylor’s self-aware lyrics state, “And I wouldn’t marry me either / a pathological people pleaser / who only wanted you to see her.”

All true Swifties know that “Enchanted” was inspired by Owl City’s Adam Young. They never dated, but they did bump into each other randomly one night — and the creative sparks flew.

Tay-Tay explained, “It was about this guy that I met in New York City, and … it was this overwhelming feeling of: I really hope that you’re not in love with somebody.” The secret message in the lyrics spelled out “ADAM,” and Young was so impressed he uploaded a cover of “Enchanted” featuring his own lyrics.

All fans know that Taylor wrote “Style” about her English boyfriend, Harry Styles. But did you know that “Out of the Woods” is also about the ex-One Direction singer? The two dated from late 2012 until early 2013 and even went on a romantic Christmas skiing trip together.

But it ended in disaster when Harry lost control of their snowmobile and crashed. The lyrics state, “Remember when you hit the brakes too soon? / 20 stitches in a hospital room.” And Harry still has an Indiana Jones-style scar on his chin to this day.

After Harry Styles dumped her, Swift had a “magical” relationship with Scottish DJ Calvin Harris. But in June 2016, “Tayvin” split amid rumors Taylor had another man. Calvin accused her of trying “to make me look bad” and told her to “focus on the positive aspects of YOUR life.”

Taylor wrote a scathing track about Harris, singing, “I forgot that you existed. It isn’t love; it isn’t hate; it’s just indifference.” In response, Calvin Harris released a track called “Olé,” which dissed Taylor’s new boyfriend.

After splitting with Calvin Harris, Tom Hiddleston became Taylor’s latest rebound. He was even spotted wearing an “I Heart T.S.” t-shirt. Their whirlwind romance lasted just three months in 2016. After the breakup, Swift wrote the most devastating song on her 2017 album Reputation.

The lyrics suggest that she used poor Tom Hiddleston as a rebound, a metaphorical getaway car, to get over Calvin. The first few weeks with Marvel’s Loki were fun, but the relationship eventually ran out of gas.

Taylor Swift and Katy Perry used to be besties, but in “Bad Blood”, she describes how their “mad love” for each other went away. They fell out because three of Taylor’s dancers left her Red Tour early so they could join Katy’s Prismatic Tour.

Taylor told Rolling Stone magazine she felt that Katy had “tried to sabotage” her. The lyrics state: “I was thinking that you could be trusted / Did you have to ruin / What was shiny? / Now it’s all rusted / Did you have to hit me / Where I’m weak?”

Taylor Swift dated Hollywood hunk Taylor Lautner after meeting him on the set of Valentine’s Day in 2009. The whirlwind romance only lasted a couple of months before they went their separate ways. Swift sang about “Your tanned skin, your sweet smile” on her 2010 album Speak Now before apologizing for a “rough night in December” when she dumped him.

We’re just glad it wasn’t a full moon! In 2016, Lautner revealed “Back to December” was about him. When asked his opinion of the song, Lautner mused, “That’s what she does.”

Tay-Tay has often been criticized for dating men and then using her crushing breakup to write number-one hits about them. Her “boy-crazy” persona has followed her throughout her career, and “Blank Space” seemed like she was admitting the media was right about her.

Especially when you hear the lyrics, “Oh, my God, look at that face / You look like my next mistake / Love’s a game, wanna play?” However, Taylor explained the song is a self-aware parody of the “psycho serial dater girl” character that the media makes her out to be.