please meet my newest quarantine project: taylor swift playlists categorized by the development of my favorite motifs and themes in her songs!
can you see right through me? : songs about seeing others and being seen or known.
this is a big world, that was a small town : the romanticization of city life from her younger songs, the fresh new excitement of moving to a big city combined with the loneliness, the realization that the city has only become a fishbowl as more eyes are on her, her lover as the city.
i pace like a ghost : songs about being haunted or feeling like a ghost
2 a.m. who do you love? : staying up late, her most romantic moments happening first late in the night because she can’t sleep, then because it’s the most private time she has
i don’t wanna keep secrets just to keep you : beginning with the romanticization of a secret relationship until she realizes just how draining it is to keep secrets
oh, i remember : for better or worse, she’s always remembering!
it rains when you’re here and it rains when you’re gone : ALL the songs mentioning rain!
love’s a game, wanna play? : love as a game, mostly sarcastically
the worthwhile fight : the passion and fighting in her earlier relationships, until she realizes the person she loves is involved in the fight with her not against her.
in dreams i meet you in warm conversation : meeting her lover in dreams
we can follow the sparks, i’ll drive : he drives, she drives, her mom drives. everyone’s driving
would you run away with me? : asking someone to run away with her, find privacy somewhere. first, in fantasies, then asking someone to genuinely follow her around the world
i don’t want you like a best friend : taylor’s take on the friends to lovers trope
up in my room and our slates are clean : taylor’s room starts as a very childish place, and somewhere she goes to fantasize about love. it then becomes the only private place she has between her and her lover, it becomes a sanctuary.
