The Swiftie and The Scholar - The Faith Crisis of Would've Could've Should've

Episode Date: August 7, 2025

In this episode of The Swiftie and The Scholar, Uncle Jerry and Angela dissect Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve from Taylor Swift’s 2022 album Midnights. They briefly discuss their own church connections, explore the various religious imagery and references used throughout the song, and come to understand that they relate to the song in similar but different ways. Uncle Jerry grades the song and brings in some poetry by Elizabeth Barrett Browning to round out his thoughts on the sadness of the track.Works Cited:Rhetorical Theory and PracticeImmortal Technique – Dance with the DevilLove Story (1970 film)Sonnets from the Portuguese – Elizabeth Barrett Browning – Affiliate LinkLes Miserables – Victor Hugo, Christine Donogher – Aff LinkThe Legend of Rose Latulipe

Welcome to The Swiftie and The Scholar, the podcast where we examine the lyrics, lore, and literary legacy of Taylor Swift. I am Angela McDowell the Swifty. And I am Dr. Jerry Coates, the scholar. Hello, Uncle Jerry. Hello, Angela. How are you today? Doing really well, thank you. Lovely day.

Yes. Are we having fun yet? Absolutely. Do you feel like a professional podcaster yet? Not yet, no. Neither. Okay. Okay, so today our song that we're digging into has a lot of religious imagery and undertones.

Maybe not even undertones. Maybe they're more explicit than undertones. So let's talk about our relationship to church and Christianity or any other religions you'd like to talk about. Okay. I specifically grew up in the Methodist Church, as you know, your father-in-law. my grandfather was a Methodist preacher, and that's how I grew up. I also went to a Christian university and have since pulled away a bit just for reasons unknown, really. I mean, I know the reasons, but mostly.

But still very much, like, consider myself a believer, a Christian. and love when Taylor puts religious imagery into her songs because it always feels very, it always feels very relatable because this song that we'll get into does feel like a little bit of religious trauma. And that feels relatable to me as well. What are your thoughts? About my own religious path? Yes.

Okay. So I was born into. the Salvation Army. And yes, to those of you who are watching and listening, the Salvation Army is an actual church. It was founded in the mid-19th century by General William Booth, no relation to the assassin. And it was Booth's idea that Christianity ought to serve the poor more effectively, and there were a lot of poor in England in the mid-19th century.

They had a lot of things like the poor laws And they had just passed a reform bill of 1832. I'm sure you remember. Always, yeah. They're dead away with families going to prison together, which was actually a thing. Charles Dickens' dad went to prison for debt. And so the family went with them. Dickens got a job as a young 12-year-old working in a boot-blacking factory and went home on weekends to prison.

Oh my gosh. So, you know, I love the Salvation Army. I love the work that it does. My parents were salvationists. My grandparents were Salvationists. One of my great-grandmothers was a sergeant major of the Oklahoma Territory. Oh, okay. Which is to say she was a lay leader in the Salvation Army church.

It's called the Army because of the passage in Ephesians chapter 6, which talks about putting on the whole armor of God. But the Salvation Army is a very fundamentalist church. I tend to be a fairly forward thinking. Yeah, same. I'm grounded in historical literary interpretations. And so when I met your aunt, I married into the United Methodist Church. Yes.

So, yes, I've been a United Methodist all my life. I still go to a Methodist church. A lot of people mistake me for a Catholic because my PhD in history is in medieval studies and particularly on the Virgin Mary and hagiography, the study of saints' lives. So I'm a member of the American Mariological Society. I've spoken at the American Mariological Society and at conferences having to do with Mary and or saints. So you have to know a lot about canon law. One of my minors is in medieval legal studies in canon law. So that would be law established in the Catholic, within the Catholic church, outside of things like common law or King's Law.

So, yeah, people mistake me for a Catholic a lot. You often teach Sunday school, yes, at your church. Yes, I've taught there, and I've taught summer courses at a local seminary. So, yeah. Okay. Didn't know that. Yeah. Learning so much.

There you go. And this song, so we're going to talk about what have could have should have. And this song, I think, is exposing religious trauma through a different lens almost. I don't know. But, yeah, I have trouble with the modern day church only, I think, because of, politics. Mm-hmm. And the religious right is against, you know,

basically everything I believe in, and I have a hard time reconciling that. But that's it. Sure. And we come, we always come to literature. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. All other elements of culture through our own lens.

Yeah. And that's your lens. Yeah. You own it. It's fine. Yeah. So that's kind of where this song, that where where how I yeah how I view this song and why I love this song so much okay yeah so we're

talking about the song yeah let's get into it okay so would have could have should have it's actually from Midnights which came out in 2022 um I believe it is on the bonus tracks of Midnights so there was an original Midnight's album and then at 3 a.m. the same night that the album came out she released like seven more songs. Oh, wow. Okay. While we were all sleeping. Hmm.

Okay. I bet she was sleeping too. Yeah, probably. And this was one of my first favorites from that album. It's just very dense to me. But what are your first impressions? Okay, so my first impression. You know, when I always print them off.

Yes. And I always make notes as I go through. I always read them through once entirely without writing anything. And my first impression is clearly, I felt like, first of all, it's a personal story about someone who was as a young girl taken advantage of by an older man. Yes. But she places the tale of that personal story in this rubric of a lot of religious imagery and references. I also rhetorically like the if-then statements that she makes. And so that's a really fun rhetorical trick.

Yeah. I mean, we can talk about that. But it's pretty cool. She maintains it consistently throughout the song. Yeah. And so I have to give her real props for doing it. So this song, before we get into it, sorry, I should have said, this was written and produced by Taylor and Aaron Dessner. So Aaron, we've talked about Jack Antonoff a little bit.

Aaron Dessner is her other, like, main collaborator. He's from the band called The National. They started working together for folklore. And I feel like where he and Jack differ, it feels like she brings Aaron in on the more, like the songs like this. So this is very, I don't know. They always feel like heavier, a little deeper, sadder to me.

I love an Aaron Dessner track. So that's kind of another thing that you'll, I think, you can kind of learn to pick up on as you hear more and more of these. I'm already up to number three or four now. It's amazing. Practically a professional Swifty. I think so. Okay. So let's get into it.

Okay. Go for it. Well, so the first thing that I do notice is. is the if-then statements, right? So I'm rhetorician. So you see, if you would have blinked, then I would have looked away at the first glance. If you tasted poison, you could have spit me out. If I was paint, did it splatter on a promising grown man.

And if I was child. So these are conditional statements, what we call them in the world of rhetorical analysis. And when I went back through, after having read it a couple of times, I thought about it in terms of the religious imagery that is imposed on the song. And I actually did think of John 14, 15. Okay. Okay. If you love me, keep my command. Oh, yes, yes, yes.

Because she says, you know, if you had loved me, I would have kept the command, you know. So that's one rhetorical side of that very, the first verse. Another rhetorical element of the first verse are the metaphors. Okay, so she says if you tasted poison, poison obviously a metaphor, you would have spit me out at first glance. So, you know, she should have been poisoned to him because apparently she was much younger. But he didn't taste the poison. But he didn't. Yeah. And if I was some paint, did it splatter. What's interesting about the last conditional statement is it's not a metaphor. Right. Right. It's not metaphorical. She says, and if I was a child, well, she was a child. She makes a claim in this poem. She was a child. So the cool thing is she pushes the metaphors until the last line. And then she throws the metaphors out and says, no, but I was a child.

And, you know, in what world did you get to wash your hands of that? Yeah. Yeah, which is pretty nice, right? And then, of course, you've got to wash your hands thing. So my note is like Pilate. Yes, that's what I was just about to bring up. Yeah, that also feels very biblical. Right.

So Pilate washes hands in the book of John, you know, asks Christ three different times. John is very based on the number three. So three appearance to Mary, three appearance to Nicodemus, three appearance to Thomas. Pilot asks, you know, again and again, you know, what have you got to say? What is the truth? There's a great line from an essay by Francis Bacon. What is truth, jesting, Pilot asked and did not wait for an answer. So, you know, I always feel a little bad for Pilot because he's a Roman official.

You know, he's doing his job, but then doing your job is also what made concentration can't work. Right, right, yeah. Yeah. Which is relevant again somehow. Yeah. So the thing that sticks out to me in this line or in this first verse, what is the, and if I was some paint, did it splatter on a promising grown man? So we always hear, you know, in these, like, cases of sexual assault and, you know, of these, like, you know, if it's a college guy and they're like, well, we don't want him to go to prison because he's just a promising young man and his whole life ahead of him. So she takes that, but he turned, she turns this into a promising grown man.

Like you are old. Yeah. But still, the world is going to protect you because you have a promising future ahead of you still. Okay, so I'm going to admit to you, Swifty. Yes. That I have grown to appreciate her use of language. Uh-huh. In one of our early songs, one of the ones you had me read,

she uses a word with two or three different meanings, you know. The snap. Yes. Yeah. And I really wondered if the word promising had a double meaning. Oh. Right. Because certainly, as you say, you've got the cliche.

say he's a promising young man, well, he's a promising grown man. So she substitutes the word grown for young, but also promising means. Yeah, so she's making promises to him. And he's making promises to her. Oh, that's what I meant. Yeah, he's making promises to her. Yes. So.

Interesting. Right. So the promises turn out to be lies. The promises turn out to be, you know, the ruination of her childhood, as it were. Mm-hmm. And I wondered if she was working again on that double entendant. Yeah, I didn't pick up on that. That's good.

That's why I'm here. Yes, exactly. Okay, amazing. Yeah, I like that. Moving on? Yeah. Okay, the chorus, ooh, all I used to do is pray. And of course, now we're back in the world of religious practice, right?

She's praying. And what did she pray for? Well, what does a year? young girl pray for, you know, a good life, a good relationship, you know, a healthy relationship that's reciprocal and appropriate. Well, woulda, coulda, should have. Yeah. Yeah. Right. She's got that like almost a shrug of a shoulder, but with terrible consequences for her. Yes. If you'd never looked my way. So what's the cool thing about the condition? statements in the first verse,

if this, then, that, if this, then that. What she does at the end of the first verse is she changes the metaphor to reality, and what she does in the chorus is she changes the conditional statements from if then to just if. Right? She forces us, the reader, or him, the interlocutor, the person to whom she's talking, to finish the stage. Yeah, I was going to say.

So she just, it just ends there. And you get to fill it in. I love that. I think that's very cool. Yeah. You know, everybody knows Edgar and Poe, because in ninth grade, you read The Telltale Heart. You know, Poe actually wrote just a handful of poems and short stories

and like a couple of novella. And he doesn't have an extensive portfolio of writing in the creative realm. But he was an editor for Atlantic Monthly. Okay. And he wrote a lot of critical works. And one of the things I remember from reading Poe's criticism is he said that the best writers always leave a window for the reader to participate in the work. Right. And so what she's done with this conditional statement is where she leaves off the then, if she leaves a window for our participation.

Interesting. If you never looked my way, then what? Yeah. Then I would have retained my childhood. I might have developed in a different way. But thank you very much you ruined. Yeah, yeah. You will ruin my whole life.

Right. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Fun. The chorus. So we have a pre-chorus and a chorus. Yes.

The chorus, I think this first core, the chorus is so cool. Yes. Okay. Yes. I should have, would have stayed on my knees. I would have. have kept praying, I would have kept living in the innocence of my childhood religion, but instead, you didn't look away.

Yep. And neither did I. I damn sure never would have danced with the devil. Okay. At 19, which is very young. Yes. Okay. Dance with the devil is a phrase that really took me.

Okay. Initially, of course, I thought of the first. Batman movie. Of course. Dance with the devil in the pale moonlight. Oh, okay. You remember that line? Okay, so I have to admit, that was completely out of the literary historical world.

Completely without religious context, but I just want to thought it. I mean, it's fair. Everything's fair. But you know the next thing, like immediately I thought of dance with the devil is kind of a cliche. She doesn't use words. carelessly, so I'm not going to say it's a cliché she should have rewritten. I wondered if she knew Immortal Technique. What?

Do you know the song by Immortal Technique? No. So there's a song by a rapper. I guess not. There's a song by a rapper, Immortal Technique. Okay. So you should check it out. Okay, yeah, we'll link to that.

Immortal Technique was a rapper who came out with this song, this titled, Danceed with the Devil. Yeah, 2001. 2001. You got, hey, you pulled it up. There he is. Tough dude. Yeah. So the song doesn't have a lot of links to this poem, but it is interesting because it's a song about a young man who, I can't remember the name, Billy.

I can't remember it. But anyway, this young guy wants to get. get into a gang and he has to perform an egregious sexual act. Oh. Yeah. And it turns out that I don't want to ruin the story for him. He wants to listen to the song for the very first time, but it turns out that it doesn't go well for him.

Yeah. I can imagine. Yeah. But what's interesting about the song is it's narrated in rap style to the song from Love story. Where shall we begin? Do you know that song? No. No. It's a song from Love Story. What's Love Story? Is this a movie?

Oh, sorry. Love Story is also the title of a Taylor Swift song, so. What can I say about a 23 old woman who died? I think that's the first line of love story. Oh, okay. So it's a kind of soap opera movie. Okay. that was made, I think, in the 70s about these two people who fall in love and everything looks rosy, but she gets cancer and dies. So, Where Shall I Begin tells the story of their love. Okay. And it's a very romantic, sweet song, and it's the background for Immortal Techniques rap song titled Dance With the Devil.

Okay. Yeah. So you've got love story and danced with the devil kind of mixed in together. Interesting. Yeah. So I don't know if she ever heard of him more than me. I'm going to put that at the top of my list of questions to ask Taylor Swift whenever I get the chance. Yeah, when she finally understands that we're talking about her.

Taylor, reach out to Angela, not to me. She's the Swifty. Okay, so but what do we think? because you're saying, you know, you've picked up on that. Her words are careful. Right. So what do we think that that metaphor, I would assume? To dance with the devil means to, you know, to take chances that is going to imperil your mortal soul.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So, you know, obviously she took a chance and it imperiled her soul. Gotcha. Okay.

Yeah. So she, and she took that chance at 19, which, you know, informs us and him that she was at it in her age of innocence. And that it was an unfair act that this older person, that this promising grown man would be the devil with whom she dances. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Can I tell you who we all know, assume, and know who this song is about? Absolutely. I don't know this. It's John Mayer. Oh, John. You grown man. So he was like 32.

Oh, really? Okay. And they dated very briefly when she was 19. Okay. It's rough. Yeah. So he's in his 30s and she was 19. Uh-huh. I'm thinking back to when I was 19. Yeah.

She actually, I think this song was released when she was 32. As like a looking at it from his age, like looking back at. So Midnights is, you know, a collection of stories about things that have kept her up in the middle of the night. Oh, okay. And like we talked about on the first episode, she was re-recording her old work. due to it being sold out from under her. And so the album that she wrote in the aftermath of her relationship with John Mayer is Speak Now. And I think when she was re-recording that, it was, you know, she was reliving all of these stories that she had told and reliving the life experiences that she lived at that time.

And I think that's why we got this song because she was looking at it in hindsight as a, a 32-year-old when she was dating a 32-year-old when she was 19. Right. Yeah, I guess it begs the question, would she, would I have done something like that at age 32? Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. It's rough because you're at such an emotional and developmental disadvantage. Right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. John? Can I tell you, buddy?

Maybe he's, you know, learned. Maybe he's an older and wiser man. Maybe. The next line, again, gives us more religious imagery. Oh, by the way, I wondered if staying on my knees had sexual implications as well. Oh, oh. I never considered that. Wow.

But many things to consider now. Yeah. Yeah, I guess it could have. So the line after at 19 and the God's honest truth is that the pain was heaven. So she admits she enjoyed it at the time. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

What 19 year old wouldn't enjoy? Right. What 19 year old wouldn't enjoy the attentions of an older person. Yeah. A rock star. All right. God's honest truth. It's an idiom.

Mm-hmm. You know, God's truth is the ultimate truth. God's seal is truth according to the Bible anyway I made a little note in Islam Al-Hakh is something that a Muslim would call God which means literally

the truth so God is the truth but now that she's grown she's scared of ghosts memories are like weapons like weapons as a simile so she's moving from metaphors and verses swan to assimilate here.

So remembering them are like facing weapons. It's the daggers of the mind. Yeah, so the ghosts. I always, this always conjures up in my mind. When I, when she's saying I'm scared of ghosts,

memories feel like weapons. So that to me is like the memories are these ghosts like, like the memories of them together and like an apartment or something are like floating up here and she's like picturing them. always like see it very like literally almost like she's remembering it and it's like floating there in the ether and she's scared of it because it's still hurting her it still hurts her yeah so even

even though she's writing this in her 30s now right um i love the last line of the chorus and now that i know the truth so that was then this is now so again you got that juxtaposition if then then, you know, and now, I wish you'd left me wondering. Yeah. Right. So that's the, she goes back to that incomplete, if then, conditional statement. The incomplete one is, if you'd never looked my way, then you would have left me wondering. Yeah.

And that would have been fine. Yeah, but also, I, that to me feels. So I wish you'd left me wondering. So that's like I wish this wouldn't have happened. I wish I was always thinking what if. But to me, the what ifs are always just as haunting as like the bad things, you know? She actually has a line in other songs that she says, I knew you'd haunt all of my what ifs. And to me that is like, I wish you would have left me wondering.

When you were 19, you certainly didn't think that. But now at 32 you are like, okay, maybe that actually was really damaging. But she was, she was just as she was in it when she was 19 because the pain was heaven. So yeah, I don't know. I always find that interesting, the perspective that you gain from like, oh, actually, what ifs are okay. Like we're actually fine with what ifs. Yeah. You know, I do I have to admit that I took this kind of personally?

I did wonder, you know, when I met your aunt. Yeah. Before I met her, you know, that there were girlfriends in my juvenile years in my, you know, teens. And, you know, I mean, I had opportunities to date them, to be with them, to make mistakes with them. And I always do kind of wonder, well, what if I had actually done that? But then you have a couple of cousins that may not have been around now. And we like those cousins. I like them very much.

I think it's natural in life always to look back and wonder what the what if. But the what if is she would have been wondering but she wouldn't have felt the pain. She would have been wondering but she wouldn't have suffered the abuse. So I'll take that over the pain or the abuse. Yes. You know, I might wonder what might have happened with those other relationships. I had a wonderful life with my wife.

Yes. Right. So, yeah, that's, you know, that's the then following that if statement. Yeah, agreed. It's so good. I love that chorus. Verse two. Yes.

If, okay, now we're back to if then. Yes. Right. So she's maintaining the conditional statements. If you never touched me, I would have gone along with the righteous. which is interesting she would have maintained her innocence. We have the religious implication of being righteous, of being a righteous girl, righteous woman.

You know, is she talking about maintaining her sexual purity? I don't know. You know, maybe she's talking also about maintaining her emotional purity. Yeah. You know, I do, you know, I mentioned in our very first discussion that, she uses the sissura a lot, the break in the middle of a poetic line. The if-then statements create the breaks in these lines. Yeah.

So the pause in the line, this poetic pause that makes you, it's rhythmical. So I'm anxious to hear how it sounds in the song because I haven't heard the song. Right. Yeah, we didn't say that. I don't think. You haven't heard the song. I don't know anything at all about it except for the pause of my head before me. Yes.

And so I'm interested to hear how she uses the Sasura. But, you know, other than being rhythmical, Sashir also force you to stop and think about the first part of the line before you moved to the second. So she forces you to focus on the if you had never touched me. And there's such innocent words, but knowing that she's 19, it felt like a violation. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. So she forced me to stop them. Thanks, Taylor. She did it with the Sysheura. Yeah, she did it. I would have gone along with the righteous if I had never blushed. I hadn't reacted to you the way I did. If something in me hadn't been needy or if something in me hadn't actually enjoyed the attention.

So she's actually playing fair here. Yes. I found that to be interesting. Yeah, she's very much has her. her autonomy in this situation. Then they could have never whispered about this. So yeah, people must talk

about their relationship. Oh, I mean, we all talk about all her relationships. There you go. Of course, it is. And how's that going for you, Taylor? That's got to be just awful. Yeah. I'm sorry.

Yeah, and it's like, it's kind of a double-edged sword because she started out writing these songs when she was a teenager and she's like, these are the things that I'm feeling, these are things I'm going through, I'm going to write about them very honestly and seriously. And then she kept that up and as she gained a following,

we're always kind of, you know, throwing that back at her. And so it's, it, and it's how she's made her career, how she's made her art, how she's made her money, all of the things is, you know, on the backs of her feelings.

Right. And so it's like, same with this song. She had an autonomous hand in us wanting to explore the relationships and wanting to know what's going on. But at the same time, like, it must be so awful to always have people nitpicking and talking and saying you've dated too many people or you were wrong in these choices. and, you know, all of those things. Yeah, I actually get tired of recording artists or anyone of any level of fame who laments, oh, I just can't have a private life anymore. Well, you know, you have your millions of dollars to console yourself with.

Yeah, just make a blanket of your dollars or a pillow of your dollars. And what she strove for, you know, fame eventually has its darker side. And that is people will talk about it. Yeah. Speculate about you. But at least she plays fair with us. Yes. Right?

Yes. I, you know, she's not among some of those that I can't read. If you never save me from my boredom, I could have gone on as I was, right? So she must have, you know, it must have been exciting for her to have the attentions of this whole event. She admits it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So she owns that. Pretty cool. So I love the address Lord, right? But Lord, you made me feel important and then you tried to erase us. So obviously she is addressing him like, oh, Lordy. Yeah, yeah, that's how I take that. But she likes to use words with multiple meanings. And so I'm wondering to her, is she characterizing him as the Lord, the Master.

is she characterizing him as her Jesus? Yeah. Interesting. Right. Yeah. So, but because, you know, because it's not like an interjection, but comma, Lord, comma, it feels like a noun of direct address. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

She's like Lord. Yeah. Yeah. So he becomes like Christ. He becomes her substitute religion. Mm-hmm. Yes. I, sorry.

The substitute religion, she has so many, there's so many little lines throughout where she's like, this thing became my religion, this thing became my drug, this thing became, you know, my guiding light. And so I think that's like a common theme that you're going to, you're going to hear. Well, I think, okay, now I'm going to just stop and speculate on. Okay, yes. The nature of the self-aware human being. as a self-aware human being, I understand that there are some things that are my obsessions, right, that that holds sway over me in ways that maybe I should practice my religious devotion more carefully. You know, obviously, if you look behind us, this is a small portion of what I would characterize in my library.

there's another wall of books there and it runs down the hall and I've got another bedroom with books. So, yeah, I do have a lifelong obsession with learning and reading. And Angela played into that when she pitched this student. Yes, I did. But at least I'm self-aware enough to know that that is my obsession, that it is a parallel religion for me. That's the same as Taylor Swift is for me. You know? Not Taylor Swift the human.

I'm not going to say, well, maybe it is a little bit. But like Taylor Swift, the artist, Taylor Swift the music, Taylor Swift the brand, you know. I think all of that, I mean, that's the same. Like if I could have rooms like this of Taylor things, I would, you know? Right. Just devoted entirely. But to return to the song, the painful thing is he erases that. Right. And I can't imagine that. I mean, I have read all the novels of Charles Dickens. All the novels of Jane Austen or Thomas Hardy. I love reading poetry. I can't imagine. I worry in my old age, my dad had Alzheimer's, forgetting those things. You know, those things. I study religious history. Yes, I know that the great schism came in 1054 between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox.

But someday if I forget those things, if they're erased from me, I would feel a personal tragedy. Yeah. Devastating. It would. Yeah. It would be. It is a fear. Yeah. And it happened to her when she was 19. Yeah. Yes. So I hope it doesn't happen.

Yeah. One, oh, sorry, no, go ahead. And then I'll have something to say for this pre-chorus. I'm done with that. Okay. Well, the pre-chorus, the next line, is, I want to relate this back to a line in the second verse. So she says, oh, you're a crisis of my faith. So this, I think, is kind of the crux of this song.

Is that, and it's like, is this man and what he did to her, which we don't know, but, you know, it's a crisis of her faith, but is it a crisis of her Christian faith? Is it a crisis of her faith in herself? is it a crisis of her faith in humanity? Is it a crisis of her faith in literal religion, you know? And that's what I wonder about, so I take it as your crisis of my faith,

like my actual Christian faith, is how I interpret it. And so when I go back up to verse two and say, if you never touched me, I would have gone along with the righteous. So I take that as, you're a crisis of my faith and now I can't believe that like God would let this happen to me.

And if it hadn't happened to me, then I could have gone along with the righteous and lived this like righteous Christian holy life. Oh, interesting. Yeah. Yeah. But I do wonder if that's taking it too literally. No. No, I don't think so. I underlined, it's interesting because I like to make a lot of notes.

I like to make a lot of notes. Yes. And when it came to that, that second pre-chorus, And I looked at that line, you're a crisis of my faith. I just underlined it and then left it. And moved on? Well, and move on. It bothered me.

Okay. Yeah. And I don't mean bother me and it's not as if it were inappropriate for the song. I mean, it bothered me because it implies a crisis in other areas, you know, a crisis of her faith in herself, right? Her ability to self-control, to self-govern. apparently at 19 she gave all that up in this relationship yeah and that was a crisis for her and I did wonder a crisis of her image of womanhood you know we have this um we have this almost

cult of virginity right where if you're not a virgin who yeah um just a chewed up piece of gum that's exactly right um you know and so I wondered at 19 had she had she come to understand understand that there is no crisis of virginity that, yeah, or did it bring about that crisis of self-image? And then there is, as you point out, the literal crisis of faith. Yeah. Right. Is do you feel abandoned by God because God let this happen? Right, right.

I think she's self-aware and self, you know, she's willing to take some personal responsibility. agree. Yeah. But yeah. But at some point, you know, you do have to wonder when bad things happen to good people. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You have a crisis of faith. And I think so. I think that's natural. It's hard not to. Yes. Agreed. That's when you go back and reread. Yeah. Yeah. So your crisis of my faith would have, could have, should have if I have only played it safe. Right. But you know you can't. Yeah.

Right. Where's the fun in that? You know, that's the other thing that I thought of. I did try to identify with being 19. And I tried to think about those things that I did when I was in college. Once at a party, I was looking at a small bathroom window while urinating. Okay. In an apartment on the third floor.

Uh-huh. Okay. I was at a party. I went to this bathroom and I was using the facilities and the window was open. And I realized the window overlooked the swimming pool. Oh, my God. And I went back and told the other people, you know, I bet I could jump out that window into the swimming pool. And they all really wanted me to demonstrate that.

And I did. Did you make it to the pool? I mean, I guess you did because you're still here today. I'm still here today. I did make it to the swimming pool. one of the other members of the party thought it was a hoot and um he tried no he was um his left ankle short of making the pool um he he hit the side of the pool with his left ankle and broke it so we made a trip to breckinridge hospital in austin that night and the doctor asked how did this happen well you see this guy

a crisis of my faith. When we are 19, we do not play it safe. Yes, yes. And you're hardwired to think you can survive anything. Right. So we're back to those conditional statements, right? In the pre-choruses, she likes to leave us with incomplete conditional statements. Yes.

If I have played it safe, the completion is then I wouldn't have been hurt. Then I wouldn't have lost my innocence. But then I wouldn't have had this experience. Then I wouldn't have learned, right? Yes. Yeah. It's all one package. Yes.

Yeah. So good. Okay. So then the, oh, this is this course exactly the same? I never would have danced with the devil. Yeah. Yeah. Scared of ghosts.

Memories feel like weapons. I wish you would have left me wondering. That's right. She wishes, but then she knows she wouldn't have had this learning experience. Yes. And then the bridge. We love a bridge. We love a Taylor Swift Bridge.

Man, she packs the. this one up. Yeah. Starts off. God rest my soul, right? As if she's dead. So, of course, the Latin phrase, God in Pacham will rest in peace.

Uh-huh. That's RIP. Yes. To those of you, non-Latin scholars. You know, so she's dead to that past. I don't know.

Dead to her innocence. I don't know. I miss who I used to be. I miss that child. That innocent, young girl. And she can't quite lay the she can't quite lay the memory to rest.

She can't, the tomb won't close. Yeah. So she's going with metaphors again. So she's back on the metaphors. The tomb, the stained glass, the wound. For the rest of the bridge, she's got a bunch of them. They are packed up. When you see the tomb won't close.

Do you, like, what does that do? What do you see in your head? what's the first thing you see in your head? Yeah, the first thing I see, I think, is an old-fashioned, like, family vault with an open door. Well, what's the first thing you see? I, for some reason, always see, like, where Jesus was dead and they were rolling the stone away. Yeah. And, like, the stone isn't, it's not all the way covering the hole.

And that's it. she is resurrecting these feelings. And in fact, by getting them out, maybe she is undergoing her own resurrection. Yeah. Yeah. So, yes, I think this is intentionally a metaphor for the tomb of Christ. Yeah. It doesn't close.

Three days later, it rolls up to the side. And so we have the stained glass windows in her head. So an interesting fact about this. Okay. Stain glass windows are obviously very, that's, That's what you have at church. You see stained glass at church. There is a rumor, and I do think it's true because I did Google and saw pictures of it.

At this time, John Mayer lived in an apartment in New York City that was a converted church, and it actually had stained glass windows still. Wow. And so I feel like she is, she's talking about literal stained glass windows. while also talking about figurative stained glass windows. Okay, that's really fun. Yeah, I mean, that's fun. Of course, I was sitting working out all kinds of,

how could she mean stained glass? What do I think I mean when I think of stained glass? And, of course, like you asked me, what was the first thing I saw with Tomb, the first thing I saw was stained glass. I've been to Chartre, the great cathedral of Sharra. You see the great rose window dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Yeah.

I see... Back to your interests. That's my interest. I see the heart of York. York, York Minster, the great cathedral there in York has a heart-shaped stained glass with five lancets, five long, thin lancets called the Five Sisters. Oh, okay. They're done in very early stained glass in a gray-stained French style. Or, you know, or I see the stained glass of Saint-Chapelle in Paris.

Paris that starts the late Gothic style. The church at Saint-Chapelle is very famous for its stained glass. And there were stories of people walking in being so stunned by the color that they would faint. There's a very famous Marian miracle that is supposed to have happened where Mary is supposed to have ridden a beam of colored light down and cured a group of people of their illness. That's interesting. Now, you talking through that makes me think, because I always just picture instantly the stained glass of like the church that I grew up in. But you saying all of that makes me think.

So in a lot of Taylor's discography, she uses color a ton to demonstrate different feelings and moments and all of that. And so now when I'm seeing, because I always went to the literal stained glass windows, now I'm thinking the tomb won't close. stained glass windows in my mind that I'm thinking of the color, like the beautiful colors and the like the rich colors of the stained glass, like that relationship while it lasted was so like colorful and vibrant to her. It could be. And now it's like that all of that is still in my mind all these years later. Yes, I love that.

Yeah. Yeah, I love that interpretation. I had not thought of that. I mean, me either until just this moment when you were talking and I was picturing it all. collaborative learning. Yes. So she regrets him all the time. I regret you all the time.

This is looking backwards. Yeah. Also a novel by a guy named Bellamy. But yeah, looking backwards is rough. You have to forgive yourself from that. I think that's what she's trying to discover is forgiveness for these wounds of her mind. Mm-hmm. Forgiving herself, forgiving him, forgiving everybody.

Right. involved. Yeah. She fights with him in her sleep. Sleep could be a death image as well. Yeah. Right. Yeah. The wound won't close. So I did wonder about the wound and the sign. I keep on waiting for a sign, you know, because I'm tuned this way.

I thought of the stigmata. Okay. Yeah. Right. I mean, why wouldn't you end with the rest of this song? Sure. the wounds of Christ, the five wounds of Christ that never close. You know, I thought of, I thought of the Book of John, the Gospel of John, which has been alternatively titled the Book of Signs, because in John, he's constantly examining signs of the meaning of Christ, signs of the coming resurrection. Interesting.

Yeah. Yeah. So she's like waiting, like, when will I be resurrected? When am I going to? When will I see these things? When will the wound close? When will the tomb close? Right.

And then ends with that same sad line. I regret you all the time. All the time. Yeah. Yeah, that's hard. But she's not done. Nope. Still more.

A lot to say on the matter. So she goes on with another if then. Yes. Right. Conditional statement. if clarity's in death, if when you die, you finally get a moment of pure, perfect clarity, then why won't this die? I thought this was done.

I thought our relationship had died. And so then why don't I have clarity as to its meaning and put it behind me? Yeah. That kind of does go back to that. I fight with you in my sleep, sounding like a death, the sleep. Yeah. And then I felt more, I wondered about biblical allusions in the next line. years are tearing down our banners, you and I living for the thrill of hitting you where it hurts.

This next line is a real, real banger. It's nice. Yeah, years of tearing down our banners. So, okay, banners, I wondered if that was a biblical illusion because I thought of Isaiah. There's a banner for the nations, you know. I thought of the song of Solomon, which is a beautiful love song, right? Yeah. His banner over me is love.

Okay. There we go. I don't know, Taylor. You got it. Are you that close a reader of the Bible that you thought of the song of Solomon? Yeah, I've never really known what to make of that specific line because I don't, I never could figure out what the banners were. But that, I mean, that's as good as a guess as any, I would assume. To raise a banner, I mean, banners appear multiple times in the Bible.

And so they're, you know, to raise an evidence. Ebenezer, and Ebenezer is a kind of banner, if you will, to put a snake on a stick and hold it up. You know, to hold up something that you raise up and look at in faith and worship, right? Okay, yeah. It occurs multiple times in the Bible. Yeah. And so years of tearing down our banners, you and I. So that's just more of her being like somehow this banner of us is like still up and I'm still tearing it down.

But it should have been better than it was. It should have been, yeah, it should have been something I could invest my faith in. It should have been something inspiring and it's not. Oh. The last line will give me a living for the thrill of hitting you where it hurts. Yeah, a little vindictiveness. But that's, you know, relationships and are often vindictive. Yes.

And then give me back my girlhood. It was mine first. Yeah. I think that's really a thing. funny. Yeah, it feels, yeah, so it feels so childish, right? Like, it was mine first. I was playing with that, you know, that was my toy. Right. You don't get it right now, but it's like, I think that's, she, she's saying, I was just a girl. I'm allowed to be childish. I'm allowed to be selfish in this moment and say, give it back. You ruined my childhood. Right. Yeah. And then we go back to

the chorus and it's more of the same. She's just, I think the song is recursive, that is it comes back on itself, you know, because both the chorus and the outro. Yeah, they're just

repetitive. Right, they're repetitive. You know, and the first time I read that, I thought, well, this reads a lot like a song where you've got to have redundant elements so that listeners can remember it as an oral work, you need repetition because we want to memorize it, we want to think about.

And so I felt like it was kind of nod to orality. But the more I read through it, the more I wondered if she does that to examine, yeah, the recursiveness of her inability to forget that relationship. She can't forgive herself. She can't forgive him. Yeah. She has trouble dealing with it at night. Yeah, she's telling us over and over again because she's been,

living it over and over again. Yeah. It's like that waking dream. You have at 2.30 in the morning where you wish you could stop thinking about it and just go back to sleep. Yeah. Yeah. So she keeps going. So the rest of these, the rest of it is just the same.

It's repetitive stained glass windows in my mind. The tomb won't close. The wound won't close. And then we end on, I regret you all the time. That's right. It's a shame. It's a shame to say that about a relationship. Yeah.

Yeah. You'd like to think that you learn things from relationships, that you advance, that you take something away from that personal, you know, closeness. Mm-hmm. But apparently. Apparently not. Okay. What are your thoughts before we listen? Okay.

So I do kind of have, I had a weird thought about this poem because I do read a lot of poetry. Mm-hmm. And I have taught a lot of literature. I feel sad that this relationship, which feels like child abuse, I was reminded of Fantine in Les Miserables, right, where she was taking advantage of to the ruination of her life. It's a wonderful book, though, by the way, if you've never read the book and you have a couple of minutes because it's a thousand pages long. So this is a relatively new translation. Yeah, that's cute. And you can see I've made a few notes.

When I read, I do tend to make a few notes. But yes, it's, um... That's beefy. It's beefy, but it's well worth the read. I, you know, if you just watch the movie or the musical, you don't understand, for example, the role that the bishop plays. I mean, there are more than a hundred pages on just the bishop. who's a wonderful character

and they could have made a movie out of his own life. It is one of the most beautiful passages of prose I've ever read. It's a really nice new translation by Christine don't know her. Don't know her. Don't know her. But I thought a little of Fantine and the abuses she suffered. I am going to also say that I thought about another poem.

You must have heard Sonnet 43 from the love songs of the Portuguese. I don't know that I have. From the Sonnets of the Portuguese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Oh, okay. I do know that name. It's very famous. Very famous. First of all, let me pause and say this is one of my favorite books.

What is the book? This is the Sonuts of the Portuguese. Oh, okay. You just said that. So Robert Browning was in love with Elizabeth. Elizabeth. And when they moved to Italy, she would garden outside as she turned dark in the sun. And he called her My Little Portuguese. Oh, my gosh. Okay. I actually love that.

This is sonnets from the Portuguese, mostly addressed to her husband, Robert Browning. The reason why I love the book is it's just beautifully. It's handmade. It's covered in leather with 24-carat gold. gold. It's Oh, that's pretty. The end pages are in French silk. It's sewn in binding. All the gatherings are hand-sown.

And it's a handmade book. It's hand-compositive and gouty old-style press. So this is actually inked and pressed out. How old is this book? Well, it's actually made the 1970s. Okay. So it's a fairly new edition, but

it's handmade. That's cool. I'll see if I can find a link to that. and put it in the notes. You know, there are some books you have because you love them. You like the story. You like the material. I love this one because of its beauty. Yeah, it is so pretty.

Yeah. The edges. The edges are just, yeah. So this is the how do I love thee poem. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. Oh, yes, yes, yes. I love to do the depth and breath and height.

We do know this. My soul can reach. But there's a line that I just felt echoed in the song. It says, I love thee with a passion put to use in my own. old griefs with my childhood's faith. Oh. I love thee with a love I seem to lose with my lost saints. I love thee with the breath, smiles, tears of all my life.

And if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death. What's sad for what it could have should have, is it should have turned out like this. Yeah. that she loved her love life, her husband, Robert Browning. And he restored her faith. He brought back memories of childhood's faith. And, you know, the way we believe in God when we're a child. Yeah.

The way we believe in Jesus. Faith like a child. Yeah, faith like a child. And because he restored that faith, she, she, imagines that she'll carry that love beyond death. Yeah. Yeah. And so this is one end.

This is the other end. Yeah. It's a spectrum. It felt like a spectrum. And I don't know. I guess I thought about this one in the context of Sonnet 43. For sure. Yeah.

So. Fun. Shall we listen? Gooseys. Yes. Okay. Let's listen. And then we will get your thought.

on what this one actually sounds like. And again, we'll probably have to cut this part out, but we'll get your thoughts right at the end. We'll come back with your thoughts. What are your thoughts? Okay, so of the ones you've played for me up to this point. Yes. I think the song was the most instructive to understand the poem.

Okay. Okay. Okay. What I really noticed in the song is usually you pause at the Sashira, right? When people read poetry, they do it badly by reading to the ends of lines. Yes, yes. So you're supposed to read to punctuation, not to the end of the line. So when I was reading this, I didn't read to the end of the line, right?

You don't, you read the punctuation. You know, so, so I love thee with a love I seem to lose with my lost saints. I didn't say, I love thee with a love I seem to lose. Yeah. With my lost saints. I love thee with my breath, smiles, tears, right? Yeah. Right.

So you read the punctuation. What was interesting is she ignored the Sashira. Yeah. And she broke at the end of the line in the song. And what that made me realize is the word would have, could have, appears at the ends of lines. I don't know how I missed that as a reader. Oh, yeah. Right.

And so, you know, like you should always notice what the first word and the last word of a line of lines are. Because they're signposts. You look for a sign? They're signposts by the poet telling the reader, this is an important word, right? So she ends the line with would have, and she sang to the end of that line, right? She said, if you would have,

if you would have blink that I would have, and then she paused. Right, and she said, if you would have, if you taste a poison, then you could have, and then she paused, which is not what you're supposed to do actually when you're reading poetry,

but it's what she did vocally because she wants to underscore the words, would have could have. And then in the pre-chorus, she ended with, she ends or should have. I know, right? I don't know how I missed that, but yes. Yeah, never would have, never would have could or should have caught on to that. Yeah.

So I really liked hearing the song. The other thing that I thought was really interesting is with the line, if clarity's in death, then why won't this die? Right. You know, again, if I'm reading it as a line of poem, I would say, if clarity's in death, then why won't this die? Yeah, but she's really like... She does not. She says, why won't this die?

It's like, bam, bam, bam, bam. Yes, it's nails on a coffin lid trying to shut that lid. Yeah, get that tomb closed. Right. Yeah, and so pretty cool. And then the redundant outro that we said, oh yeah, this is like more of the more of the, the kind of stuff you hear in the middle of the night rolling through your head. It almost seems to pace faster because the words are almost all monosyllamic.

I regret you all the dog. Oh, yeah. I can't let this go. I fight with you in my sleep. The wound won't close. You see the monosyllabism? Yeah. And the monosyllabic element drives the song.

It like impels her down that road in her head while she's sleeping. She's trying to watch that out of her head. and she wants to do it. It's like that dream that goes faster and faster and faster. But I sat there listening to it and it's not. Yeah, it stays the same. It just feels faster. It feels faster.

Yeah. Yeah, especially because it's driven by her monosyllabic form in this last bit. Yeah. Nice stuff. I also, my, I think my favorite thing is the way that we talked about, give me back my girlhood. It was mine first that feels very childish. and she's kind of like screeching it.

Like she's like, like a child would, like screeching at you. Like, yeah, it was mine first. And that's why I always love. But yeah, it's a fun one. Yeah, really good. I mean, I think I learned more or she pointed me in a better direction by singing. With the music? Yes.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah, that feels like, I mean, I guess you've said that the other ones were like made better by hearing them. that was, this was the one that, it changes the whole. Yeah, she brought me to a better understanding of the whole. Okay, okay. Yeah.

Yeah, she's going to get higher grade for that one. Uh-oh. We already have all A's here. I know, I know. Okay, so let's get into your grades for this one. We've got to have a better tagline for this, you know. You just like, and now the grading segers. Oh, okay.

I don't know, but you work on it because you're that person. Okay, I'll work on it. And also, if people, listening have any ideas they can tell us okay so would have could have should have grading criteria we have five um five criteria lyrical strength narrative and structure production and atmosphere lore and literary references and emotional impact so floor would have could have should have lyrical strength lyrical strength you know now that she's pointed me in the direction of noticing the would have and the could have and the should have at the ends of lines,

which I should have noticed earlier. And the most... What it could or should have. I know. The monosyllabic element, especially at the end, that makes the pacing feel faster. Yeah, it's nice,

nice work. I guess I'm going to say 95. Okay. Starting out strong. Narrative and structure. You know, this is kind of like a dream consideration. So it's not as strong in structure as some of the other works.

But I think that's intentional. Yeah, it's just a little messy all over the place. Like just these are my thoughts. Right, because I'm in the middle of the night and I'm having this dream that won't stop. I'm having this open tomb that I can't shut down and just sleep. Maybe 93. Okay. I mean, I think it's intentional, but it's still a little messy.

Okay. Fair. production and atmosphere yeah that's that one's a little tougher on this one that is a little tougher on this one does it support the lyric does the production support the lyrics and mood

is it effective are we talking about the song either or like the production of the song or just the lyrics creating the poem creating the atmosphere that yeah I mean I guess I'll say 91 okay lore and literary reference

So this one is more like biblical references. So I'm, yeah, I'm not the person to ask because I was pulling this thing apart every which way, you know, I was thinking about, you know, all kinds of different references. Can I tell you one more? Yes, please. So I thought of the legend of Rose La Tulepe. So in La Tulepe's, so this is a French-Canadian folk tale. Okay. And maybe it belongs in the folktale.

Yeah, in the folklore album. But you had me thinking about folklore. And so in the French-Canadian story of Rose, she goes to this dance. And this goes along with the dance with the devil one. Okay, okay. She goes to this dance, and this unknown man shows up. And he's incredibly handsome, and she falls instantly in love, and she dances all night. She dance, and he turns up to be the devil, and he takes her soul away.

Oh, oh, no. I know. Yeah, that's what happened here. That's what happens here. It is the legend of Rose La Toulousepe. Well, this came after folklore, so maybe she really studied. Oh, maybe she did. I don't know.

While she was writing folklore, and then it just carried over into this album. But for all the literary references, for the biblical references, for the signs, for the banners, I thought it was interesting, the Christ of her faith, the righteousness. I was intrigued and she had me digging through all kinds of different ideas about it. So I'm going to say 97. Oh, that's our highest yet. Really good. Okay.

Emotional impact. That's hard for me because this was a painful song. And I did think of Fantine in Les Miserables, right? and the tragedy of her life and how, you know, it could have resulted in more tragedy had she not been rescued, had her child, Cosette not been rescued. I did think about Elizabeth Barrett Browning,

whose life turned out so differently. Right. Because it restored her faith. And so, yeah, it was, she made me feel overwhelmingly sad. Okay. I mean, I think that was the goal, right? I think so.

Is 97? Okay. Yeah. I think, yeah, that's really high for me. Okay. This is going to be a good grade. That brings us to, oh, it says zero. That brings us to, and that's a 95.

Do we get to round up? 94.6, can we round up? That's a 95. 95. 95. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

this is a love this one. You have your reference materials and I have my reference materials. Yeah, these are definitely hers. Okay, yeah, that's so fun. I'm glad you loved this one. I thought you would like it. I didn't know if you would like it that much, but 95 feels really good. Yeah, yeah, it was good.

Good, okay. So I think that's it. Do you have any other thoughts? I don't. I look forward to doing another one. Yeah, me too. I'm excited because this was an interesting song. Yeah.

There's more on the air-related albums that pull. At this one, I have the most, like, religious imagery and kind of from that angle. But there's more where this one came from. Okay. Well, everyone go get your copy of Lemis. Yes. And read it. It's so thick.

Or you can read a poem. Yeah. Okay. So that is all for us today. subscribed on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you will listen to your podcasts. If you want to watch us, we're on YouTube. You can find us on Instagram and TikTok at Swiftie and ScholarPod. Angela, me, the Swifty, is on Instagram at Angela Wyatt.

And Uncle Jerry is not. Jerry's quietly reading in his room. Yes, he's tabbing up some books. Okay, and we will see you next week for another song. Bye.