Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: 3AM ~ Paris- Watching Outcasts & Monsters [IB]

I’m going to try to chunk this one into very small bites so you can get to the end 🙂

The connection between the song and my research snippets will become more and more apparent with each post.

Paris 

…I’m so in love that I might stop breathing/Drew a map on your bedroom ceiling/No, I didn’t see the news/‘Cause we were somewhere else/Stumbled down pretend alleyways/Cheap wine, make believe it’s champagne/I was taken by the view/Like we were in Paris/Like we were somewhere else/Privacy sign on the door/And on my page and on the whole world/Romance is not dead if you keep it just yours/Levitate above all the messes made/Sip quiet by my side in the shade/And not the kind that’s thrown/I mean, the kind under where a tree has grown…/…I wanna transport you/To somewhere the culture’s clever/Confess my truth/In swooping, sloping, cursive letters/Let the only flashing lights be the tower at midnight/In my mind

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: 3AM ~ Bigger than the Whole Sky [(maybe) Part 1]

I might do a part 2, as I found another very interesting source. Will alll the new songs coming out (heh) we’ll see what I do.

Bigger than the Whole Sky 

Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye/You were bigger than the whole sky/You were more than just a short time/And I’ve got a lot to pine about/I’ve got a lot to live without/I’m never gonna meet/What could’ve been, would’ve been/What should’ve been you/What could’ve been, would’ve been you…/…Every single thing to come has turned into ashes/’Cause it’s all over, it’s not meant to be/So I’ll say words I don’t believe

Grieving giving up her opportunity to come out, missing the (queer) person she might have been.

***Trigger Warning***

conversion therapy

Though this is very bleak, we’re going to end on a lighter, more hopeful note:

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: 3AM ~ The Great War

The Great War 

My knuckles were bruised like violets/Sucker punching walls, cursed you as I sleep-talked/Spineless in my tomb of silence/Tore your banners down, took the battle underground/And maybe it was ego swinging/Maybe it was her/Flashes of the battle come back to me in a blur/All that bloodshed, crimson clover…/…You drew up some good faith treaties/I drew curtains closed, drank my poison all alone/You said I have to trust more freely/But diesel is desire, you were playin’ with fire/And maybe it’s the past that’s talkin’/Screamin’ from the crypt/Tellin’ me to punish you for things you never did/So I justified it/All that bloodshed, crimson clover/Uh-huh, the bombs were close and/My hand was the one you reached for/All throughout the Great War/Always remember/Uh-huh, the burning embers/I vowed not to fight anymore/If we survived the Great War/It turned into something bigger/Somewhere in the haze, got a sense I’d been betrayed/Your finger on my hair pin triggers/Soldier down on that icy ground/Looked up at me with honor and truth/Broken and blue, so I called off the troops/That was the night I nearly lost you/I really thought I lost you/We can plant a memory garden/Say a solemn prayer, place a poppy in my hair/There’s no morning glory, it was war, it wasn’t fair/And we will never go back/To that bloodshed, crimson clover/Uh-huh, the worst was over…/…Always remember/Uh-huh, we’re burned for better/I vowed I would always be yours/’Cause we survived the Great War

***Trigger Warning***

suicide

Sources:

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: Midnights ~ Midnight Rain

Midnight Rain 

…I wanted that pain…/…All of me changed like midnight/My town was a wasteland/Full of cages, full of fences/Pageant queens and big pretenders/But for some, it was paradise/My boy was a montage/A slow-motion, love potion…/…I broke his heart ’cause he was nice…/…It came like a postcard/Picture perfect, shiny family/Holiday, peppermint candy/But for him it’s every day/So I peered through a window/A deep portal, time travel/All the love we unravel/And the life I gave away…/…I guess sometimes we all get/Just what we wanted, just what we wanted…/…I guess sometimes we all get/Some kind of haunted, some kind of haunted/And I never think of him/Except on midnights like this (midnights like this)

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: Midnights ~ Dear Reader

Dear Reader 

Dear reader/If it feels like a trap, you’re already in one…/…Get out your map, pick somewhere and just run…/…Burn all the files, desert all your past lives/And if you don’t recognize yourself/That means you did it right/Never take advice from someone who’s falling apart…/…(You should find another)/…Bend when you can, snap when you have to…/…You don’t have to answer, just ’cause they asked you…/…The greatest of luxuries is your secrets…/…So I wander through these nights/I prefer hiding in plain sight/My fourth drink in my hand/These desperate prayers of a cursed man/Spilling out to you for free/But darling, darling, please/You wouldn’t take my word for it/If you knew who was talking/If you knew where I was walking/To a house, not a home, all alone ’cause nobody’s there/Where I pace in my pen and/My friends found friends who care/No one sees when you lose/When you’re playing solitaire/You should find another guiding light/Guiding light/But I shine so bright…/…You should find another/Guiding light/But I shine so bright/You should find another

***Trigger Warning***

suicide

Swiftionary: Haunted House

House seems to be a physical place where someone lives. 

But Taylor also uses “house” as the embodiment of a person and their sensibilities. 

The house in Seven (is Taylor, I think, but could be the childhood friend) is haunted (gay? conflicted? imperfect?) 

 being haunted/gay makes the homophobic father mad. 

Enter hiding in the closet-a lifelong defense mechanism. 

passing by your house can mean both riding on a skateboard past someone’s home, and James passing by Betty, the person. 

Taylor is in a conservative city.  Country music is “traditional” and constrictive.  Taylor has religious imagery in some songs so her family might abide by the Bible, and that makes her feel conflicted about her sexuality.  She does not see her queerness as positive, she deems it a curse or jinx–she’s haunted.

 There’s nothing to figure out with a boy.  That’s “normal”, accepted, expected. It’s not difficult to figure out if a boy likes you that way. 

But if the love interest is a girl–is she friendly or flirty?  When Taylor can’t breathe in this gal’s absence, she knows it’s love. 

Taylor discovers she loves a girl–she’s haunted.  She knows she’s gay.

When Taylor dares to act on this haunted part of her, there are real fears the husband will harm his wife (Taylor’s lover) and her. She has to be very, very sneaky about hiding the gay-affair, or He will burn their house of love down.

House = place of residence, including body or sensibility

Haunted = LGBTQ (in an internally homophobic person, or a person in a homophobic environment)

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: evermore ~ It’s time to go

it’s time to go

Or that moment again, he’s insisting that friends/Look at each other like that…/…That old familiar body ache/The snaps from the same little breaks in your soul/You know when it’s time to go

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: evermore ~ Coney Island

coney island

Sorry for not making you my centerfold/Over and over/Lost again with no surprises/Disappointments close your eyes/And it gets colder and colder/When the sun goes down/The question pounds my head/What’s a lifetime of achievement/If I pushed you to the edge/But you were too polite to leave me?/Do you miss the rogue/Who coaxed you into paradise and left you there?/Will you forgive my soul/When you’re too wise to trust me and too old to care?/…Sorry for not winning you an arcade ring/Over and over…/…Did I leave you hanging every single day?/…Did I paint your bluest skies the darkest gray?/A universe away…/…But when I walked up to the podium/I think that I forgot to say your name

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: evermore ~ cowboy like me

Cowboy like me

Oh, I thought/This is gonna be one of those things/Now I know/I’m never gonna love again/I’ve got some tricks up my sleeve/Takes one to know one/You’re a cowboy like me/Never wanted love/Just a fancy car…/…You had some tricks up your sleeve/Takes one to know one/You’re a cowboy like me/Perched in the dark/Telling all the rich folks anything they wanna hear/Like it could be love/I could be the way forward/Only if they pay for it/You’re a bandit like me/Eyes full of stars/Hustling for the good life/Never thought I’d meet you here/It could be love/We could be the way forward/And I know I’ll pay for it/And the skeletons in both our closets/Plotted hard to mess this up/And the old men that I’ve swindled/Really did believe I was the one/And the ladies lunching have their stories about/When you passed through town…/…Now you hang from my lips/Like the Gardens of Babylon/With your boots beneath my bed/Forever is the sweetest con/I’ve had some tricks up my sleeve/Takes one to know one/You’re a cowboy like me/And I’m never gonna love again/I’m never gonna love again

Taylor Swift’s Gay Moments: evermore ~ right where you left me

right where you left me

…Trends change, rumors fly through new skies/But I’m right where you left me…/…Pages turn and stick to each other/Wages earned and lessons learned/But I, I’m right where you left me…/…I, I swear you could hear a hair pin drop/Right when I felt the moment stop…/…Everybody moved on/I, I stayed there/Dust collected on my pinned-up hair/They expected me to find somewhere/Some perspective, but I sat and stared…/…Did you ever hear about the girl who got frozen?/Time went on for everybody else, she won’t know it/…/…How it was supposed to be…/…And you’re sitting in front of me…/…They say, “What a sad sight”/I, I stayed there/Dust collected on my pinned-up hair…/…’Cause I’m right where/I cause no harm, mind my business…/…I’m right where you left me…/…You left me no choice but to stay here forever

https://bloominghaus.com/news/pride-month-flowers/#violets