The Swiftie and The Scholar - The Secretive Destruction of Illicit Affairs

Episode Date: September 24, 2026

Today we’re covering our penultimate folklore poem with Illicit Affairs. Uncle Jerry finds this song fits perfectly within the category of folklore, and shows us just how Taylor Swift’s use of language showcases the lack of love in this song.*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!Works Cited:InterlocutorImperative verbDramatic ironyThe Book of JonahSynecdocheThe Road Not Taken – Robert FrostAphorismAssonanceAlliteration*The Pleasure of the Text – Roland BarthesAnaphoraSynesthesiaSonnet 138 – William ShakespeareThe Swiftie and The Scholar Grading MatrixFollow Us:Patreon⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠Threads⁠Angela’s Instagram⁠Uncle Jerry’s InstagramAngela’s YouTube Channel

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'm Dr. Jerry Coates, the scholar. How you doing, Uncle Jerry? Gosh, I'm swell today. Are you sure? Yeah, I'm okay. Okay.

Oh, goodness, okay. Angela, I'm going to tell you, Angela has been working me hard. I just complained to her because we've had to record a little. head because I'm going out of town. Yes, we've been doing this every week. So, I'm retired, huh? Taylor Swift again.

But this is a good one. I like it. Okay, good. Spoiler. Yeah, just saying. Okay. I did not predict that you would like this one, so this is a nice surprise. Yeah, yeah.

I do think it does have, like, fun, there's fun parts. I'm always, you know, I mean, I say this, I think, about every time. But I'm always curious to hear it because I like it just as it is. And I almost don't want to hear the music. Interesting. It's like it's a good poem. It fits in folklore. It's well constructed.

It's got a lot to think about. Yeah. And I don't need the music. Which is weird. I know I've been it's weird for all of you for me to even say that. Yeah. I feel like people are like. What are you talking about?

But it makes sense to me, like especially, because, you know, even if you hear a song, like, say you hear someone's cover of a song before you hear the original of the song, and you like that cover. Sometimes if you go back to the original, you're like, well, I don't even like this as much. You know what I mean? Because you're like, I heard this one first and I already liked it and this was already in my head. And so I don't like the original. So it kind of makes sense, like, this is how you're being introduced. to it and you like poetry. Well, yeah, that's it.

Is I like poetry? I've been anxious to see her body of work. You are feeding that by having us do the whole folklore album and it's like this is a good poem. It fits in the context of folklore. I like it as it

is. And so I, you know, I mean, it's funny because when I read comments, sometimes people will say, well, I like the album version better. No, I like the puddle version better. I don't know. You know, and I'm thinking, well, I like the poem better.

Yeah. I mean, we're all here for different reasons, you know? Well, I mean, sometimes I like the song. I'm not saying I don't like the music. I'm just saying that, you know, I like this one, and I'm thinking when I hear the music, I'll go, oh, yeah, that's one too. That's good. That's good.

That's exactly what I thought it was going to be. Okay. So today we are doing illicit affairs. This is our second to last. Folklore track. Yeah. Very exciting for me personally. I don't know about you.

Yeah. So just a couple more weeks until we get to hear all of Uncle Jerry's folklore thoughts in one cohesive. I'm looking forward to thinking about it. Actually, I've had like little corners of my head, you know, well, like last week, you know, when I read something, I thought, oh, yeah, that fits with another song in folklore. Oh, yeah, that's going to be fun to look at and think about it.

Because I haven't really, I haven't taken the time to think about it yet. I'm waiting. Yeah, yeah. We're going all. Get all the pieces of the puzzle first. Yeah, but it's pretty cool. Yeah, I'm excited for to hear all of that. And I'm excited to sit down and like spend some time thinking about it as a whole body of work as well.

And then coming to talk about that. Okay, this is another Taylor and Jack Antonoff track. We haven't had one of those in so long because we've been just doing Aaron Dessner and Taylor tracks, written by Taylor and Jack and produced by Taylor and Jack. So I think that's kind of it. for me. We are going to watch. She performs just the bridge and the outro on the Eros tour. Oh, really? Okay. Right after August. Like, so August ends and then she kind of just goes immediately into this bridge, which is interesting.

Yeah, it's interesting. She would fuse those two. Oh, I'm going to have to think about that. So we will watch that. And that's like one of my favorite parts of that whole performance. It's very good. Okay, take it away. Well, okay, Tayjack. Swifting off. Yeah, swift and off. Ooh, I like that. Yeah, it's good.

Swift and off. Okay, so Elicit Affairs, right off the bat, you see the title, and you go, okay, this is about an affair, or it's going to give views of an affair because it's plural, right? Right. All right. affairs. And so when I'm reading, I'm looking for who's the speaker, who's spoken to. Are there multiple speakers? Are there multiple interlocutors? That is someone you, okay, so I use the big word interlocutor. That's someone you talk to. Interloquare is the Latin verb to speak. Yeah, I knew that. Okay. Interlocutor.

Obviously. So my wife was listening to our most recent posting, and she said, maybe I ought to go over all the literary devices one more time. And I said, oh, I think we've mentioned like 50. Yeah, it's a lot. But it's a good point. Like not everybody who, I mean, we get new listeners all the time. Yeah. And, you know, not everybody keeps up when I say epizuxes.

And they go, ah, yes. Obviously. We talked about that three weeks ago. Well, just so everyone knows, I feel like I haven't made this clear enough because people are always asking, in the episode description, I link everything. So any other works that we talk about, any literary device, I link to a, you know, a website that will give you the definition and examples. And if you want to learn more about the works, I'll link those or I'll link them like to Amazon where you can buy. So that's all there. It's it there in every episode, just in case y'all want like extra homework.

I'm reading a Shakespearean sonnet today, so... Nice, okay. It'll be linked in the description. It'll be linked in 138. One of your faves, I'm sure. Yeah, that's right off the top of my head. Okay, so yeah, it's plural. So we don't know if, are there multiple affairs?

Is she talking generically about the nature affair? Who's speaking, who is listening? Is there anyone talking back? You know, all those questions come just with the title. So it's kind of fun to think about as I read and read and read, reread and reread. The poem begins with make sure.

Okay, so it's an imperative verb. You know, it's a command verb, right? You have to do this. Okay, so it, the question arises to whom is she speaking or with whom is she speaking? Or is she speaking to herself? Well, she does use the word you.

So make sure nobody sees you leave. And so I'm going to read through like three of these And make sure nobody sees you leave Hood over your head, keep your eyes down You notice all imperative You know tell your friends You're out for a run All imperative

Right so the first three lines Are all imperative verbs So they read like a list It's either a set of commands If she's talking to someone Or it reads like a list of a checklist Of things to do Yeah, like a to-do list almost like.

How to having a day. Yeah. Like these are the things I have to remember. Right. Thank you. Thank you, Taylor. Yeah. I'm going to be, so when I cheat on my wife, I need to be sure no one saves me leave.

Keep a hood over my head. It's like a to-do list, either that or it's someone telling you how to do it. So back to the first line, you notice the second person address you. So who's you? I mean, I'm still wrestling with you. this. Yeah, I think we all are. So, you know, is she talking with herself? You know, that certainly works because it appears as though later on she's inside the affair. Yeah. But, you know, is she talking with someone else? Is she giving instructions? Is she talking to a best friend about how

her affair unraveled? Right, right. The things that she's like, these are the things I had to think about every time. Right. Yeah. And so I, you know, by the time you get to the end and after you go back through several times asking this question. You know, it's like, oh, she's talking with yourself. And then you go back through again, you think, no, it feels like she might be talking with a friend about the nature of the affair. Yeah. And then it's like, no, he sneaks

in there. Yeah, or is she talking to the person, the other person in this affair being like, you need to do these things so you don't get caught. Right. Giving him him or her a checklist of things to do. Yeah. Yeah, it's like, and be sure and pick up the milk and eggs.

Yeah, oh, that's not kinky, by the way. I meant like for groceries. And this guys is why we have not done guilty as thin yet. I know everyone wants that song so badly. And I also want to do that song because it is like my favorite. But I just, I'm just not there yet. So stop asking. You're going to make me go and lick this song up.

I think you'll have a great time, and I'll just have to sit here and stare out that door. Maybe I'll just let you do that episode by yourself, actually. Is that what? Are there milk and eggs in this? No, I just, I just, my, my... Did you bring the milk and eggs? My brain just went off this way when you said that, and then I just needed to tell everybody that's commenting that. I'm aware, I just don't want to do it yet.

But it's coming. Stop. See, this is why... This is why. All I said is it's soon to arrive. I might need to phone a friend and bring a different host in for that episode. Today's episode is R-rated. Okay, so back to this.

So, okay, back to the first line. Yes. So, yeah, my mind keeps playing with who you is, you know, and I say, and I can't look at you. But my mind, it does. Like, I say this at the end. The ambiguity of the you is really one of the engaging elements of the poem. Notice I didn't use the word font. Yeah.

So we have concealment imagery throughout these first lines. We also have dramatic irony, right? As a reader, we know this is a list of things to do for an illicit affair because it says so in the title. Right. Right. So she's not concealing anything. So it's dramatic irony. Dramatic irony, by the way, occurs when the reader or listener knows more than the speaker. Right.

Right. So, you know, we know already this is a list of things for an illicit affair. Right. You know, it's almost like the poem begins with like a business or a procedure, you know. And so, you know, again, having read it multiple times, Like the 12th time through, I'm thinking, this is more like a to-do list and less like anything having to do with romance. Right. You know, and I found that really interesting that all the glamour, all the romantic elements are sort of drained, even at the beginning.

Yeah, it's like she already is telling us, like, this is not a fun situation to be in. Yeah. And you would think that an affair would be, you know, full of, you know, sort of danger and excitement. and it should be fun. It should, you know, fun in several ways. You know, but it feels drained of that. Yeah. You know, because of this.

And especially like the very first time I read it, I got to that line, hood over your head. And I feel like that's foreshadowing. You know, when you take someone to be executed, you put a hood over their head. Interesting, yeah. So I thought of someone on a scaffolding, getting ready to be hanged.

I had flashed back. of green mild. Oh, gosh. Oh, that's so sad. Yeah. Putting the hood over someone's head. Yeah. And it felt like this is not a fun situation.

No. Can you keep your eyes down? You know, so this is motion imagery or, you know, directional imagery. Anytime you go down, I think I mentioned, you know, when you read the book of Jonah, Jonah comes down from the mountains, down to the sea, down to the bottom of the ship, down to the bottom of the ocean. he's going to hell. Yeah. You know, I mean, so keeping her eyes down is sort of foreshadowing. She's in a kind of trip to hell.

Yeah. And, you know, this is why I like the poem. I love the foreshadowing. Already in the second line, the hood and the directional imagery down. Yeah. It's really nice. It feels like an execution, you know, not this fun, clandestine affair where you expect, you know, going to have excitement.

You know, notice the use of synecdochie. Senecteke is the part for the hole, so eyes down, you know, we're isolating that part of the body. You know, this window to the soul, as people so often call it, well, it's looking down. Yeah, and don't let anybody look into your soul. Right. Because they'll know what you're doing. Exactly, because they'll know it's an elicit of air.

Yeah. Tell your friends you're out for a run. So, you know, you're using spatial imagery again. Yeah. Right. Out for a run. And again, I think you can, you could do a lot with her spatial imagery throughout all of her songs. I may have, we may have to stop and think about that.

I think so, yeah. What places does she go? You know, this is a really interesting layered dramatic irony as well. Because we know it's an illicit affair, right? So the dramatic irony is she's already revealed what's happening. And what's interesting is the. While we know she's out, the friends do not. Right?

So, yeah. Yeah, why she's out to have the affair. The friends don't know that. Yeah. So she's out for a run. You know, why not out for a walk? Well, because you, with the next line. Why not out for a drive?

Why not out for a burger? Is she running from something? Oh, interesting. Right. So she's out for a run. running from what? To what? From whom? To whom?

Interesting. Yeah. Right? So I think that the word run has multiple meanings, a bit of a double entendre. You know, and I think that she is already constructing an alternative reality with an affair. Right. Right. I think that affairs do that, right? You know, you construct this reality whereby, oh, I'm having this wonderful romance with someone else. And so we're creating a world apart.

Yeah, that doesn't exist anywhere else in your life. Right. So my friends can't enter in, you know, my current significant other can't enter in. Yeah, I love the first three lines. Yeah. When I go over them and over them, I think there's so much. It's a very rich way to begin a poem. You know, again, one of the reasons why I'm a little ambivalent about hearing the song is I think that she does a terrific job with this.

And they're also staccato, you know, make sure no one sees you leave, hood over your head. Keep your eyes down. Yeah. Boom, bump, bump, you know. And so. That monosyllabism we've talked about before, yeah. And I try to see, is this rhythmic? Is it rhythmic?

Is it anabolic? And it's not as more, you know, the staccato style is really kind of fun in this, in as much as it is an imperative series. of directions. And then she says, you'll be flushed when you return. Huh. So that's one reason why you'd want to keep her hood down. Uh-huh.

And why you're telling people you're on a run? You're on a run because you're all flushed. But why else would someone be flushed? Because they're like, embarrassed. Could be embarrassed. This is an illicit affair, right? Maybe she's embarrassed. Any other possible reason?

I can't think of any now. Any other sort of exercise that might make one flushed. Maybe aerobics. Yeah, because we're not talking about a commode here. Flushed. Oh, aerobics. Yeah, there's a certain. Jazzercise.

Uh-huh. Yeah. Are there any of those that you do, I don't know, horizontally? I can't think of a single one. Okay, good. We'll just move on. What's the name of that other song? I need to write that down.

Yes, I think that she is having what we call semantic ambiguity. That is, she's playing with the words. She would be flushed from running, but you could also be fleshed from the excitement of an affair. You could be flushed from the embarrassment of the affair. You could be fleshed from the sex involved. Oh, of course. I don't think of that. No, no, flesh from the sex and the affair.

You know, and so I'm thinking, boy, she is just. you know, bang on with this fourth line. And I didn't plan all these. I was just going to talk about the poem. And then she moves. After giving us all these instructions, she tells us to take the road less traveled by. And I mean, come on.

Who does not know this allusion to the poem by Robert Frost? Yeah. Maybe it's because we have listeners. from 170 nations now. If you haven't read Robert Frost, then you get a pass. Yeah, if you're from like, you know, Fiji or something. Yeah, but most English readers would know Robert Frost,

and Americans in particular embrace him as a kind of national poet. He read a poem at John F. Kennedy's inauguration. So, yeah, this is a very famous poem, The Road Less Traveled by. Obviously, you would want to take various roots, home if you're having an affair. Yeah. Don't go your normal way.

That's right. So this is a literal, this fits in with the literal instructions, but it's also, you know, metaphorical, symbolic for the nature of the poem. You know, if you read Robert Frost's poem, he literally says he took the road less traveled by, and then he admits that both roads appear equally attractive in terms of being. untravelled. And but he took one and he and the last line is and that has made all the difference. So he doesn't tell us whether the difference was good or bad or neutral. Right. Right. And so the it emerges that the point of the poem isn't necessarily that it's the less

traveled. It's the point of the poem is it's it's a route he took that he cannot return to. And so it becomes a decision right. The road is the path of life, symbolically. And this is a decision that he makes to which he can never return. And that's the same as an affair. An illicit affair. Yes.

Yeah. I mean, we see this elicit affair and later on we get the addiction metaphor that emerges in the in the poem. And so yeah, she becomes addicted to this path and it's one from which she cannot veer or

and she can't return to choosing not to have the affair. Right. You know, once you've made the decision to have it, you, there's no going back. Yeah. I mean, your face is going to be flushed. And then she gets into this, the addiction, you know, metaphorical language. Tell yourself you can always stop.

Okay. So stop what? Stop the affair? Stop running. Right. because she's running. Stop on the road and go back. Okay, yeah, and like turn around.

Right. Yeah, stop and turn around. Sorry. Go back to your other life. That's not in this moment. Yeah, that life will never be unchanged, right? That old life has always temporally moved on. Right.

And you can't return unless you have time machine. You can't return to that moment in time before the affair started. You know, stop the concealment. Okay, yeah. Later on we hear about the lies. Stop the lies. Right? So tell yourself you can always stop.

Stop has multiple applications for this book. Yeah. And it's fun because sometimes she's very subtle with her language. To me, this is not subtle. This has multiple meanings. It has at least four different levels of meaning. Stop the affair, stop the running, stop the concealment, stop the lies, or maybe five stop the road, turn around.

And I think she intends all of them. Yeah. You know, and so, yeah, do I like this one? Yeah. Yeah, and I just like that because also it's, you know, I feel like we call out a lot when she kind of stops speaking in poetics and just like says the thing. And this is like a very straightforward line,

but somehow there's still all these different meetings. Still, yeah, the level of ambiguity is retained in what is otherwise, just a series of monosyllable. Yeah, it's fun. It's good stuff. And then she gives us some setting symbolism. What started in beautiful rooms, ends with meetings and parking lots. That's great.

You know, okay, so a less talented poet would say something like, you know, although it begins beautifully, it ends in tawdry spaces. Right. But she doesn't do that. She gives us concrete images. You know, it started in a beautiful room. So they go to this hotel room, you know, that's maybe a little fancier than ordinary. You know, it's not your basic twin bed hotel room.

Motel. No, it's the deluxe master suite. Yeah. Right. So, you know, I'm going to spring for the deluxe master suite for the first date on the affair. And so you walk in and you think, oh, an affair is so glamorous. Yeah, that's where that's coming in, like where you're saying it's missing from the, like you would assume that you're going to start in this like exciting danger, you know,

ooh, fun, you know, but it's like it doesn't come in until right there. And she's like, oh, maybe it started like this, but it's never going to finish like that. Right. It ended with like luxury and allurement. And where does it end? It ends with meetings in parking lots. What? Don't tell me they're like, they're reduced to being like,

teen sweating in a car. Gross. Yeah. It's like, this isn't actually fun at all. Yeah. You know, especially if if you're like 30, you know, right, right. You don't think, oh, how fun would it be to just, yeah, to fog up the windows of a car in a parking lot? Yeah. It's like, really?

Are you at the Safeway? Are you at Costco? So you get contrasting settings. And obviously, with the contrasting settings come contrasting metaphors, right? So she is symbolically represented. presenting, you know, the allurement, the luxury of the affair versus the antithesis, the tawdry space. You know, so we've got beauty versus secrecy, luxury versus desperation, romance versus pure logistics. Oh, my gosh.

Yeah, I'm upsetting. Yeah, I know. I know. Well, and that kind of, it echoes what happens at the beginning of the verse. Yeah. Right? Because she's giving the pure logistics. That is just the logistics, yeah.

Right. So it's like we're going to meet at the, you know, at the downtown Anatol in the luxury suite. And you go, ooh, that's so exciting. You know, we're going to meet at the Costco. And it's like, after they close at 10. Right, right. Yeah. Okay.

That sounds great. Yeah, that's just pure logistic. And think about how a parking lot is a public space versus private intimacy. So she's creating this, you know, contrasting spatial imagery. And just the fact that her world of luxury and beauty is shrinking to nothing, you know, it's degrading. Yeah, absolutely. You know, the whole first verse may be, or the whole poem may be, in fact, a manual on how not to or why not to. Why not to, yeah.

Yeah, because it's kind of a manual on how to, but it's also a manual. manual on why not to? Yeah, both of those. Like, this is how you do it, and do you see how awful this is? Right. You know? So, we go to the chorus. And that's the thing about Elizabeth affairs.

So she gets this editorial voice up, you know? It is, you know, I wrote down the word. It feels like an aphorism. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it feels like a proverb. You know, this is the type of thing that you would want to say to instruct friends and neighbors you know, to instruct late teens who are considering serious relationships.

That's the thing. She uses the general reference pronoun thing, you know, so immediately the reader is asking, what, you know, what's the thing? The thing is all this crap. All the things die and die and die. Yeah, exactly. And this feels like the introduction of a thesis statement.

Mm-hmm. You know, she's kind of drawing a conclusion already. Mm-hmm. Clandestine meetings and longing stairs. It's born from just one single glance, but it dies and it dies and it dies. Yeah. You know, clandestine meetings, again, that kind of sounds attractive, longing stairs, sensory imagery, sight. This echoes the whole eyes must be concealed from earlier.

You know, this is again, this is again why, I don't know, if people say she's not a great poet, I don't know what great is. If people say she's not a poet, you know, they're wrong. Yeah, yeah. I mean, flatly, because she establishes the eyes in the first stanza, and then she comes back to the eyes with longing stairs. You know, that's very clever, sensory writing. And that doesn't just accidentally happen on the page. Right, exactly, yes. Right.

So we have this parallelism between keeping the eyes down and longing stairs, you know, having the eyes up and revelation of love. Yeah. So it, you know, it starts from there, the longing stairs, and then the longer it goes on, then you have to... It goes down to keeping your eyes down. Very Jonah to go down. It does. Yeah. Yeah.

So, you know, again, this is why it's a good bone, you know. I also like the line because it's pretty. Yes. Right. Some of her best lines are pretty. It has assonance with the A's and the EI sounds. It has alliteration with S's and the L's and clandestine meetings and longings days. Yeah, it's just like so nice. It's pretty to read, right? And she's describing the pretty moments that's born from a single glance that turns bad. Pretty quickly. Yeah, and so she uses pretty language, you know, to describe the lovely side of the excitement of the early affair.

And then it dies and it dies and it dies. And the harsh D sound, it's like a hammer. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the Duh, D repetition. And the affair doesn't die once, right? Affair dies over and over and over. it produces little moments of guilt and fear and concealment and disappointment. You know, can you meet me tonight?

No, I can't. Yeah. You know, because I've got to go to my kids' piano concert. Yeah. You know, really? That's where we're going. Yeah, it ends in disappointment, realizing that the road that you took down that life is not going to be a happy one. Yeah.

And it's like not even really that real, probably. And it's not one you can return from. You don't get a do-over when you start an affair. Yeah. You know, I like the die, die, die, I like the next line of dies a million little times. Yeah, if you didn't get it the first time. I'm spelling it out for you. Yeah, she's very explicit.

It's hyperbolic, you know, it's a million times, probably not a million. And then she, I love it because she goes from hyperbole with a million. to understatement with little. Right? Interesting, yeah. Yeah, so she's playing with language again. You know, because of that, we have a paradox. You know, how can you be a million?

How can it be little? Well, it's because the million little adjustments you have to make, the disappointments, the lies, they all kill you. This also reminded me of Le Petit Mort, you know, the little death, because it is literally a kind of death. it's a phrase that in the 16th century

refer to a fainting spell. Oh. Right? But in the 19th century, you know what Le Petit Mort referred to? I do. Okay, just checking. And also, I don't know how many people know that because Taylor starts a song on the tortured poets department

with, I had died the tiniest death. Oh, really? And I've never heard anybody talk about what that line actually means. Yeah. A little death is the, in the 19th century and beyond, is a discussion of the orgasm. So your face seemed to be flushing now. I found it interesting because for me, it had a connection. And it's kind of funny because, you know, we were interviewed by, can I use our name? I think so, yeah.

Angela Moore from MarketWatch. Yes. And it was so fun, so delightful. It was. She was delightful. She was pretty terrific, yeah. I mean, more a conversation than an interview. But she was mentioning all the different things that I bring up.

And, you know, sometimes it's just, you know, personal to me when I read something like this. And I go, oh, you know what that reminds me of. And I'm sure you all have that same feeling that you have very personal interpretations of some of the lines or words. You know, sometimes when I read the comments, someone will say, well, personally, I think, and it is personal. Okay, so I have a book. This is what it makes me think of. Yeah. Roland Barr.

Rollin Barr. The pleasure of the text. Okay. Yeah. And he talks about why reading is, I don't want to say, I'm going to ask. make, but why reading brings on this little death? Okay. Why reading a great text?

And he even talks about it from the writer's perspective. Interesting, okay. Yeah, he talks about how writing a good word, that choosing the right language, you know, that the writer begins to be his or herself embedded in the construction of something, you know, unique and beautiful. And it is comparable to sexual orgasm. You know, without the smirking and the winking, you know, because it brings on a physical reaction. I mean, I can't tell you the number of times I've been reading a book and I've had a physical reaction, you know, like I will start to tear up.

I will laugh out loud. Yeah. Or something is like so good. You get like that like dopamine rush of like. You do. Yeah. Like this is like somebody wrote this down, you know, and it's like so good. Yeah.

So this isn't, I mean, I don't know if you can call it a book. book. It's a pamphlet. Yeah, I mean, it's a little essay that he wrote, The Pleasure of the Text, and it's so interesting to read through, and I thought of it when I was reading these lines about how it dies.

It dies a million little times. You know, I just thought that that concept he uses a French word for ultimate bliss. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, that the ultimate goal of reading

is this radical, ecstatic loss of self. Interesting. And I just love that. Yeah. Because you do. When you're reading a really good book, you have this radical loss of self. And I have to admit, when I was reading this poem, there were times when I thought the feeling of being trapped, imprisoned in this affair was stifling. Yeah.

You know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, there's nothing in here that feels happy and, like, I want to be here and I'm having a great time. Right. Yeah. Yeah, it just felt stifling, you know, and so it, I felt like that radical loss of self that Roland Barth talks about.

First two. Yes. After telling us that she just feels like death, we have more instructions. Leave the perfume on the shelf. So, olfactory imagery? Right. So you can, someone says perfume and you begin to smell it. Right. You know, I always had that tantalizing moment when I get into an elevator.

You've gotten into an elevator when there's a real stink. But there are times when you get into an elevator and there's this most alluring perfume in there. You know, it's like I'm all by myself and there must have been some woman in here before. Yeah, just a minute ago, yeah. Just missed her. I'm thinking, I wonder what she looked like. She smells good. You know?

It's so funny. It's just, I love the line because it makes me smell that perfume. Yeah. That she would wear, you know, symbolically the perfume associated with a lover, you know, a symbol of a presence. And yet you have to leave it on the shelf. Yeah. So it's like you're suppressing her presence. Yeah, you're not allowed to be, you're not allowed to do anything that's going to like leave any trace.

Yeah, yeah. It's like. You're not allowed to be a full. person. The lack of scent makes you invisible. Leave your perfume on the shelf. It strips you of your identity. It strips you of your attractability.

Right, yeah. Yeah, there's like, that's just an extra layer of like sensory, you know, I don't even know what the word I'm looking for, but it's just like an extra layer that would make this more fun, you know? It's like you're stripping away yourself. Uh-huh. Yeah. So you have to just be

this thing as object. So, yeah, you might as well meet in the part working lot. Yeah. So you leave the perfume on the shelf that you picked out just for him. It's like not only is it personal, but it's personal not just to you, but to him. It's like, I got this perfume because I thought that it would create physical emotional engagement and now we're taking that away.

You know, the intentionality of the affair is no longer spontaneous. Right. Yeah. You're making choices. Yeah. You're just not fun. The farther you go down that road, the more you want to talk. turn around.

So you leave no trace behind. You know, this is metaphorical and literal. You know, you don't want to leave the scent behind. And, you know, you can't leave the smell, the trace of your perfume on him because he goes home and the wife is going to say, that's not my perfume. So, you know, metaphorically, you can't leave a trace of yourself. You know, literally, physically, you don't want that smell to give him away. there's no physical remnant.

Okay, but I think what she's contrasting is the psychological impact. Right. So she's talking about the physicality of the affair, but she's really, what she's uncovering is a psychological impact of the affair. Yeah, like I have to make myself invisible. Yes. Yeah. And that can't ever feel good.

And she underscores that in the next line. Again, if you don't get it. Yeah. She's pretty explicit in this poll. Agreed, yeah. But what's cool is she, you know, she gives you the imagery, and then she gives you the explicit explanation. She says, you know, if you don't get it,

it's not just the physicality of it. It's a psychological element as well. Like you don't even exist. Right. Yeah. So it's a simile, like, it's hyperbole. Of course, you literally exist. But the existential imagery is you have to be self-effacing.

So psychologically, the costly affair is if you don't exist, right? So you just have to admit, I'm not even here anymore. Yeah, it's like you're like a, you have to treat yourself as like a phantom in this person's life. Right. Like where you're just like in and out and nobody can ever see you. And then she moves on to take the words for what they are. Okay, so this is meta-linguistic imagery.

I know, meta-linguistic. We've been bringing up meta-stuff a lot. A lot of meta. So the words she says, the promises, the emotions are only good for momentary face value. Mm-hmm. Right? Yeah, they don't have any meaning other than just what they are right in this moment. Yeah, it's not, does I love you mean anything in this context?

Do we see the word love anywhere in this poem? No. No. So, yeah, take the words for what they are. You know, be sure you don't wear perfume, baby. It's so romantic. Yeah. You know, I mean, the phrase, take the words for what they are, just dismantles any sense of romantic language being in this relationship.

Certainly doesn't occupy space in this poem. Yeah. A dwindling mercurial high. I think that's a great line. I thought you would like that one. Yeah. It's almost as pretty as a previous line with all the alliteration and assidents. You know, I love this.

you know, metaphorically high. So, you know, sex and the adventure of the affair are like a drug, you know. So it's not just the sex, obviously. It's the fun of meeting in glamorous, clandestine places. Yeah, going to the fancy hotel rooms or whatever. Yeah. However, it's a mercurial high. So mercury runs, you know, it's heavy.

It's a metal, but it's fluid, you know. And so it runs off. Also, it could be an astronomical reference. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Mercury, especially in retrograde's astronomical sign, it indicates you're going to have glitches or travel problems, travel delays, or miscommunication.

Yeah, I was going to say the communication is always like a problem during Mercury retrograde. Right. So it's what happens as your plans begin to be dismantled. Mm-hmm. Yeah, these plans are being dismantled. Yeah. So, again, I don't know if she plans the astronomical or astrological reference. Yeah.

It feels like it works too well with the poem not to be intentional. Yeah, especially saying the line before that is take the words for what they are. It's just talking about communication. Right. So, like, you know. Oh, that's good. I had not thought about that. That's a good connection.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And then she makes it clear the drug metaphor that she's been hinting at in previous lines. Again, she hammers that home, a drug that only worked the first few hundred times. I love that. I just love the language of that, the phrasing of that, the first few hundred times.

The few hundred times. So it's like they engage in this affair over and over and over again. And maybe not even just physically, but mentally she imagines him, she thinks about him. Or like a text, you know, or like, you know. Yeah. How are you? Yeah. So, yeah, the drug of the affair has dwindling satisfaction.

It only works the first few hundred times. So it's, you know, the question is, are you being emotionally, physically gratified? And, you know, I think at first both, yes. Yeah. But when you wind up in a parking lot. Never. Not good. I mean, come on.

Yeah. How comfortable. Didn't that be you know, and she like really hammers the drug metaphor home with the first few hundred times. A hundred implies lessing satisfaction with the affair, just as you might get out of any particular drug that you're taking. You know, your body adapts to it. Right. She, you know, so now she's talking more psychologically. And, I mean, the poem in the last several lines takes a clear psychological turn.

Agreed. Yes. She's not talking about the physical grader. of a sex act. You know, she's talking about the impact on her psyche. Yeah, the actual, like, emotional impact of all of these decisions. Right. Yeah.

So we go to the chorus, and that's the thing about elicit affairs. Yeah, we have repetition, you know, and now with the previous information from these last lines, we begin to fill out what that general reference thing refers to it. Yes. It's the diminished pleasure. You know, the sexual gratification begins to be diminished. It's the psychological dependence, right? Now you're you're almost byroat, dependent on those texts, dependent on the meanings.

I have to see you. Yeah. And but it's still like they don't feel this. It doesn't feel the same anymore. Right. No, it's joyless. Yeah. And you feel that the phrase, and that's the thing about Alyssa Fairs, is more moralistic in tone now.

Yeah. Interesting. So it's the same phrase, but now after filling in these gaps of what's the thing, you begin to see, oh, it's the joylessness. The thing is that the affair creates diminishing effects and psychological dependence, right? And neither one of those is pleasurable. No. And clandestine meetings and stolen stairs. You know, notice the stairs are now stolen rather than longing.

Yeah. So we're looking at thievery. It emphasizes illegal goods, right? Thief, transgression. Again, the language is both darker and more moralistic. Interesting. Yeah, I've never picked up on that. The tone really is so different in this chorus.

It feels like repetition. It is not. No, it really does change. Yeah. Yeah, because of all the information we now have, you know, she is looking at how she uses the word things. that general reference pronoun that previously had no antecedent. Now we have plenty of antics.

Yeah, lots of it, yeah. And she changes the word longing to stolen, right? So it's very clever stuff. It's not repetition. You know, there are times when I've said, oh, she could cut the chorus because it's repetitive. If you were going to publish it as a poem, no. Not here.

This one changes the vibe for the second half of the song. It does. Yeah. show their truth one single time. So, you know, there's personification like affairs have meetings, affairs have stairs like people, you know. And she's paradoxically talking about truth, right? The desire may be true, right? She truly wanted the affair.

She wanted the other. But it's built on deception. It's built as we see on lies. Yeah. So, you know, again, the language is darker, more moralistic. Yeah. Yeah. It's all about deception.

And they lie and they lie and they lie. We have repetition. We have personification. We have ambiguity. Yeah, because who's lying? Right. And how do you define the word lie? Oh.

Oh. Yes. Oh. They lie. That is to misrepresent the truth. But they also lie down. Down in sexual gratification. Interesting.

Yeah, they lie, they lie, they lie, right? You do it, you may do it a million times, and each time it takes a little piece of your soul away. Yeah, yeah. Right, so, you know, the sex is no longer gratifying. It is literally slicing bits of yourself. Yeah, they're killing you. It's Voldemort splitting and soul. That's exactly when you said that, when you said it leaves a little bit of gratifying.

for yourself, I was like, oh my God, a horrocks. So she had an affair is a horrooks. Yeah, a million little times. Okay, so we're back to the fun comparative between hyperbole and understatement.

A million little. A million tiny lies. Right. And a fair doesn't end cataclysmically, you know. Yeah. It ends through small acts of deception.

I'm just going to the grocery. Yeah, I'm just going out for a run. Yeah, I'm just going to go for a run. So we get to the bridge. I love this bridge, I would just like to say. You're alone. What do you like about it, Angel? I don't know.

I think I just really love the, you showed me colors. You know, I can't see with anyone else. And you taught me a secret language. I can't speak with anyone else. Because that is just so specific to me. You gave me two of the great lines in the bridge. Yeah. Her bridges are frequently pinnacle moments.

Yeah. So she starts with this pinnacle moment. You know, she says, and you want to scream. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, wow. Yeah, the emotional intensity. After saying, you know, after saying that there's not one cataclysmic lie,

she nevertheless then explodes. She wants to, yeah, explode. Yeah. She wants to explode. It's like, it is all. Also like the opposite of the first verse, you know, in the first verse you have lowered eyes. You have secrecy. You create excuses.

You have concealment. Now we're just exploding. Just want to scream. Yeah, you want to scream. Don't call me kid. Don't call me baby. I thought you would like that because you don't want people to call you baby either or anyone, baby. Unless they're an actual baby.

Well, it's just always so funny to me. It's okay because Leslie will call you. call me baby sometimes and I'll and I will respond by calling her infant. She'll say, baby, do you want to go have dinner? And I'll say, yes, infant. I do.

It must be fun to be married too. It's, yeah, well, I'm always thinking of synonyms. So again, we return to this imperative verb form. Yes. Don't do this. It's like at first you want to, you have to do these things for the affair, but now it's like just don't, you know. It's an aphra, don't do this, don't call me kid, don't call me baby.

You know, you see the use of diminutive terms, the characterization as a kid or baby, you know, it is a little ambiguous because on the one hand it could be endearment, it could be intimacy, but on the other hand, it certainly is condescension. I was going to say condescending or like infantilizing like, oh, you're your poor little thing, like, we'll be fine, you know. Right. Yeah. And essentially what she's saying is, look, the labels no longer apply to me.

Mm-hmm. Right. You know, our relationship has matured, I've matured. So don't call me kid or baby. A kid or baby shows up and is dazzled by the hotel room. Right. Yes. Yes.

And thinks that this is how it's always going to be. Right. Yeah. So that's not me anymore. So as the illicit affair has progressed, so has she matured. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, look at this.

God forsaken mess that you made me. Okay. Now, this is a little accusatory because when she says you made me, is she talking to the other person in the affair, the significant other? Is she talking with herself? Yeah, yes. Yeah, because you made the choice, right? You went down the road.

Yeah. We clearly have religious imagery, God forsaken, you know, the abandonment of God. It's kind of a 17th century thing to say. Okay, yeah. It's used in Victorian literature as well, kind of miserable. But it takes on more spiritual meanings. When you say God forsaken, you really intend that the spirit of God is no longer there. Well, that kind of works with this whole thing, huh?

Absolutely. Yeah. We have personification of the word mess. A mess cannot be Godforsaken. So she characterized it as its own living creature. Yeah, she deliberately uses ordinary diction with mess. You know, we're not romanticizing this anymore. Yeah, like I'm just a mess.

Yeah. She does take a step back and remember when you showed me colors, you know I can't see with anyone else. That's a great line. You know, it is synesthesia. Yes, yes. So for those of you who want the definition, yes, anesthesia is when one cognitive pathway triggers another pathway. So you show colors that you can't see with anyone else. It's like some people listen to music and they hear colors associated with musical notes.

Or like a day has a color or like a number has a color. Right. Yeah. Yeah, some people even see colors with letters. Like people who do this literally associate like, red with the letter A. Right, exactly. Right.

So, yeah, it's synesthetic metaphor. The colors are the emotional experiences. Right. Like, you've, like, opened, you purposely came and, like, opened my world and, like, made this world bigger and showed me all these new colors and things and emotions, but it's not, none of it is real. Right. Yeah.

And I was so intrigued by the line. I actually rewrote it in, like, Jerry speak. Okay. I said what essentially she's saying, you introduced me to emotional and behavioral experiences so unique from ordinary experience that I can't get it elsewhere. Obsessed.

Yes, exactly. And so this goes back to that whole drug metaphor, the conceit she builds with being hooked on drugs. Yeah, don't call me, kid. Don't call me baby. She's repeating it. She's underscoring the change from the colors she showed you, from the emotional experiences or maybe even physical experiences that she didn't receive anywhere else.

Look at this idiotic fool that you made me. You know, you hurt me and why didn't I see it? She objectifies herself as the idiotic fool. Yeah. And again, is she talking to the other person? Is she talking with herself? As we've been talking about this, I've kept that in my head and I've made a decision. Tell me.

I need to know. And obviously, like, who knows? But to me, it feels like she is, the story that I've built in my head as we've been discussing this is that the speaker is a single woman having an affair with a married man. Okay. Or a man that's in another relationship. So she is like, I think we could all agree that, like,

in that situation, the man would be more at fault for having, an affair than the other woman would be at fault for like getting into this relationship. Oh, assigning blame. Okay. I'm not saying, I'm not, I'm not saying there's no blame on like the other woman. I'm just saying like as the person in the relationship, you have more of a duty to that relationship than an outside person does. And to me, it's like she's saying in the first verse, she's like telling him all of these things because like he's coming to her house. and then she wants to put on, in the second verse, put on perfume and, like, go to his house. But she can't do that because she can't leave the scent around. And now that's why she's like, we could have had this, like, real thing and you call me kid and baby and you show me these colors.

But, like, now I'm seeing that this is never going to be real because you're in this other relationship. Okay. But maybe also that's being colored through the lens of thinking of this through folklore and, like, the folklore love triangle. And maybe this part is from August's. Yeah. Well, I think... Point of view. I think what you just laid out was the argument for why this song belongs in folklore.

Okay. Right? Because, you know, now you're stealing my... Sorry. Final comment. No, I agree with you completely. What the song does, well, you know, so your interpretation there, it sounds good and logical to me, based on what we see in the poem.

And there are other ways to view that. For sure, yes. Right. So one of the reasons why I think the song belongs in folklore is it allows us as the reader to tell stories within the context of the poem. Okay. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Right. We can all make up our own story.

That's right. That fits, probably a million different things could fit into this narrative and we can all choose a different one. Yeah. Is that fun? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So essentially, what she's doing is she's giving us the frame for a tale. And she's inviting you to supply the names.

Okay. Yeah. Or she's inviting you to build out the fictional world of, because remember, the title is plural. Right. So it can fit all the different affairs. That's right. It can fit any affair. So, you know, you're saying, you said a man who's buried, you know, why not a single woman and a woman who's married?

That's true. That's true. Yeah. Yeah. So it allows us to build out the world of affairs, you know, multiple. You know, why not talking with herself? Why not say, you know, she's clearly thinking, she's thinking in her own head. Don't call me kid. Don't call me, baby. I'm so sick of that. And then she says, look at this. An idiotic fool, you made me. Oh, yeah. So she could just be talking to herself. She could be talking to herself. Yeah. Yeah. And then she's talking to him. You taught me a secret language. I can't speak with any.

else, but the inability to have an interlocutor, someone else to speak with, leaves the language ineffectual. What good is it if you can't share it with someone else? Interesting. Yeah. So, you know, obviously have a metaphor of the nature of the language. Language equals the affair. You've taught me an affair I can't share with anyone else.

You know, like, you know, when Leslie and I went to England last year, when you guys, you you know, went to Nashville. You know, you posted pictures of it. You shared it with us. You talked about, you know, going to Centennial Park. You talked about saying the big temple. You know, what's fun is sharing it with other people. Right, exactly.

Right. What goods a vacation if he or she takes you on the most glamorous vacation in the world and it's an affair, it's built around an affair, you can't share it with anyone? Yeah, you just lie about it. Right. You just lie about it. But, you know, where were you? I had a work conference.

A work conference, yeah. I was in Spokane. Nothing wrong with Spokane, by the way. Hi, Spokane. Anyway, yes, the secret language that we cannot speak with anyone else, you know, it's paradox. If it's a language, it shouldn't be secret. But the affair only affects how you, the affair even affects how you communicate.

Yeah. I mean, when you take your words away, and we've mentioned words before, you know, it's a, it's a type of effacement of your individuality. Right. Yeah. So you can't wear your perfume. You can't even speak. Yeah. So let's go out.

Yes. The outro, and you know damn well, direct address, confrontational. You know damn well. For you, I would ruin myself. Okay. Hyperbole, or it's like a drug, ruins her a million little times. So this self-destructive behavior, the lies, the dies, goes over and over and over again. That's the cycle of an affair.

So she gives us kind of the life cycle of the affair. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, how it's born, how it develops, how it deteriorates, how it dies. or maybe even how it persists in death. I was going to say because this kind of doesn't seem like it's... Completely over? It's done. Like, she's kind of like, this is terrible.

You've done all these things. We've done all these things. It feels terrible, but you still know that I would ruin myself for you. That I would ruin myself for you. Yes. Yeah, so it dies, it dies, it steals your individuality. It makes you lie. Heck, you can't even smell yourself.

And so nevertheless, nevertheless, there is some level of persistence in an affair. Can't go back down that road. Right. Okay. Okay. Literary patterns. Okay. You know, the central metaphor becomes a conceit, the drugs.

You know, she talks about, she used the word high, drugs, the word, repeated use, diminished effect. the willingness to ruin herself, you know, all extend this drug metaphor pretty nicely done throughout the whole poem. I mean, the speaker recognizes that the relationship is instructive, but the speaker also cannot abandon it. Right. Right. Yeah. So. Yeah, it's like an addiction.

Yeah. It's like an addiction. And I think there's an interesting metaphor around language. She mentions a secret language. It's intimate, but also it's isolating. So, you know, she can't use it with anyone else. Then what good is it as a language? It isolates her.

It creates secrecy. She mentions the use of the word words. And so the poll moves from the public to the private. You know, we have open roads and friends and appearances and being seen to the middle discussing the perfume, the traces, the private meetings. And then the bridge is almost entirely psychological. It highlights her inner thoughts. So we move from the public world into the secret inner world. Gotcha. Okay.

And lots of repetition. Dyes, dies, lies, lie, lie, don't call me a million times. Well, because she's doing it over and over and over. She's caught in this terrible self-destructive cycle. So, yeah, what I think about its placement in folklore is it has this wide open window. You know, so often I talk about the window of participation, you know, that Edgar OnPost says you've got to leave a window open for the reader to come in and participate in the text.

I think that's Roland Barth as well in the pleasure of the text. You know, I think that he says that the best words, the best writing, the best texts, invite us to pleasure. They invite us to, you know, let go of our words. rational selves and engage emotionally in a text. They also invite the speaker, you know, the writer to do that as well. So, you know, and he does use sexual metaphor, you know, and almost this orgasmic, you know, participation with the text.

So the text becomes, in effect, our lover, our someone with whom we exchange both physical and emotional selves. Interesting. Yeah, yeah. You know, she invites us to do that in this point. because she doesn't specify who. No, not a single time. There's no genders.

No gender. Except for like perfume maybe is like. Right. Yeah. Yeah. There's a female attached to the story. Yeah. But it could be, you know, almost any relationship, any time.

And it is the universality of it. I think that she's saying an affair is essentially bad. Right. You know, because it is so universal. because it can work on anyone. It's almost a prohibitive and moralistic warning about the nature of illicit affairs, plural. Agreed, yeah.

Yeah. So I guess I'm ready to hear this music. Okay. We will watch the lyric video, and then we'll just watch the little clip of the ERAs tour where she just sings the bridge and outro, and she's like real angry, and it's really good. And we will be right back.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Give us your big, your big, my big summative statement. Yeah, people are loving these summative statements. I'm liking writing them. Yeah.

It's really fun to like, you know, we've talked for over an hour now probably, I assume, and then it's nice to just like wrap it all up and a bow. Yeah. Okay, so here's, here is mine. And, you know, we were talking earlier about how so many people

the comments want to give their opinions and they use the word personally they say i personally you know there's no way to think impersonally by the way you have to own it um but but people want to have their opinion right and so i started out mine with i okay okay um i want to write that illicit affairs is typical tailor at its best okay love that okay the use of concrete details patterns of metaphor that contribute to the tale of diminishing returns offered by a love affair. Clever word progressions in the repeated lines and idiomatic phrasing or illusions all present themselves in characteristic fashion, right? This is her, this is Taylor. The road, the eyes, the perfume, the drug, the colors have contributed to the linguistic architecture of previous poems. Yeah.

Nevertheless, illicit affairs stands as a unique achievement in narrative storytelling in which the literary devices and descriptions form an integrated system rather than functioning as isolated decoration. The ambiguity of address teases the reader. Is this a dramatic monologue in which she is talking to a lover? Is this an internal monologue? Is it both? Likewise, the work presents secrecy. as both intimacy and as destructive. The affair feels special because it is hidden, yet it becomes addictive and ultimately destructive because the uniqueness of the fair can't be reproduced anywhere else.

The relationship doesn't collapse in one dramatic moment. Instead, it deteriorates through countless small acts, lies, and compromises. If love ever exist, love a word we never hear in the text of the poem. If it ever existed, it dies small deaths until it can only be characterized as a compulsion. The poem's final paradox is its most powerful that the person who made the speaker feel uniquely alive has also become the person for whom she is willing to destroy herself.

Oh, goosies. Yeah, I think that's... That's interesting, that last line. Good work, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I expected to, like the very first time I read the poem, I thought, you know, she's going to abandon the affair at the end. But she doesn't.

Yeah, which is more interesting emotionally. Yeah, emotionally more interesting. I did, yeah, I'll just, I'll read again. I mean, I like, you know, when I thought about it, I said that it's, that powerful paradox is that the person who the speaker made feel uniquely alive gave these unique, special, one-only experiences is that same person she's willing to destroy herself for. You know, that's pretty powerful.

That's the nature of illicit affairs. And I will say again that it's so aptly placed in folklore where you get to tell the story, you get to participate. Yeah, you get to fill in. All the things. Because you did and you liked it. Yeah. So I have one more thing to read to you.

Okay. And it's Shakespeare's Sonnet 138. Okay. Just because I'm old. I thought of this sonnet. When my love swears that she is made of truth, I do believe her, though I know she lies, that she might think me.

some untutored youth unlearned in the world's false subtleties, thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young. Although she knows my days are past the best, simply I credit her false speaking tongue on both sides, thus is simple truth suppressed. I'm willing to let her lie. Interesting. Yeah. But wherefore does she not say she is unjust? And wherefore, say not I that I am old. Oh, love's best habit is in seeming trust and age in love loves

not to have years told. Therefore I lie with her and she with me. And in our faults by lies we flattered be. Shakespeare turns to lie into something that's sort of

lovely and bonding between the two lovers. Like they both know that there's a lie. They both know. know we're lying, you know. And that's the difference between love and an illicit affair. Interesting. Yeah, is that the lies are mutually agreed upon. Oh, no. Okay. That is so interesting. You know, it's like, it's like when your wife says, you know, does this, does this dress make me look fat? And, you know, it's not a word that ever comes into my vocabulary because I love her. Yeah.

You know, and every inch is precious. Right, right. So I'm going to agree to tell the truth that I love her and she's going to agree to accept that truth. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And that's, those are the wonderful lies that we share, you know, as matched partners. Right. You know, but an elicit affair does not have that same line.

Interesting. Yeah, it has the destructive lie. I love that with this. That's super interesting. Yeah, this is sort of the opposite page, the other page. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Good stuff. There you go. There you go. I'm glad you liked this one. Yeah, I did. I liked it very much. I like participating in the poem. Yeah.

And I'm still not sure which. you know, which speakers when, you know. Right, because we're not supposed to be, right? I think that we're allowed to engage in the poem. Yes. And that's a wonderful gift. That is the pleasure of the text. Right.

I think that's what Roland Barth would say. Yeah. Okay. All right. Ready to grade? Yeah. Okay. Illicit Affairs from folklore.

Lyrical Strength. Okay, so yes, 98. Oh, okay. narrative structure narrative structure yes I got that clear progression you know how how an affair is born how it progresses how it destroys and how it persists yeah 98 okay production and atmosphere now we're talking about the music music was fine it was good um you know it's this is one of those works and it's a funny thing to say where I just I almost for reading the poem. Yeah. Yeah. But you did enjoy the Aeros Tour.

I did. I love the Ares Tour performance, yeah. So 95. Okay. Yeah. Lur, literary references and devices. Yeah, lots of fun devices. Repetition, paradox,

that controlling metaphor of the drugs and the reference to Robert Frost, you know, Frost's darkness. Yeah. And her increasing darkness in the poem. So 99. I know. And emotional impact. I appreciate you, Taylor.

Or letting me play the game. Yeah. I really do. Yeah, it was fun. I had more fun in this poll engaging with this boom than with a lot of them. So I'm going to go right up to 99, I guess. Yeah. And it's funny when you say emotional impact.

Like, it wasn't emotional impact like, oh, the dreaded affair or, oh, I'm so sad for her. Yeah. No, it was that, you know, again, I'm going back to rolling away. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah, it's that joyousness in letting go of myself and participating in the world that the writer creates for us. Right. Yeah.

And so, yeah, that's the joy. That's the emotion that you got. Yeah. Okay, that gives us 97. point eight. It's good. It's fine. Okay. Okay. One more to go. I know one more and we'll be done with folklore. I feel like really finally like accomplishing something here, you know. I'm a little scared actually because at some point we're going to have to talk about folklore, you know, in its unity and and does it unify and how if it does, you know, that kind of thing. So it'll be a challenge.

Yeah. Exciting. Okay. Keep coming back and we will be around. On socials in the meantime at Swifty and ScholarPod, that's both Instagram and TikTok. You can follow Uncle Jerry on Instagram at Dr. Uncle Jerry, and you can follow me at Angela Wyatt McDowell. And we will be back next week. We will. Bye.