“The Tortured Poets Department” is a vulnerable and raw album written by Taylor Swift, Jack Antonoff, and Aaron Dessner. Released on April 19th of 2024, The album is focused on combining poetry with catchy melodies. This album is a deeply reflective piece, giving listeners an insight into Swift’s emotions using imagery, clever wordplay, and storytelling.
The announcement of the album was an unexpected moment at the 2024 Grammy Awards. At this time, Swift was in the midst of “The Eras Tour,” the highest earning tour in history. On a recent podcast, she described her life during this tour as “a state of perpetual, physical discomfort,” because she performed 149 shows, each over three hours. As a result, fans of Swift were completely shocked when she announced her new album during her acceptance speech for her album “Midnights.”
Swift’s album is a sharp contrast from other albums that she has put out before. This album’s overall theme is centered on the struggle of true loneliness, loss and grief, rather than teenage romance.
The 12th song on “The Tortured Poets Department” is called “Loml.” Swift used this texting abbreviation to show her drastic change in emotion before and after this relationship, calling her partner the “love of her life,” then transitioning to “the loss of her life.” This song, like many others, is a vulnerable poem turned into music. During this song, she describes her regretful, yet melancholy, feeling towards a past relationship that she had imagined “almost had it all.”
In “Loml,” Swift wrote, “Our field of dreams, engulfed in fire / Your arson’s match your somber eyes / And I’ll still see it until I die, You’re the loss of my life.”
The 26th song on the album is titled, “How Did it End?” This song is a heartfelt ballad about the grief of a relationship. The song used a metaphor of a “post-mortem” to describe her heavy feelings, because she was unable to understand why the relationship crumbled.
In “How Did it End,” Swift wrote, “Say it once again with feeling / How the death rattle breathing / Silenced as the soul was leaving / The deflation of our dreaming / Leaving me bereft and reeling / My beloved ghost in me / Sitting in a tree / D-Y-I-N-G.”
Overall, “The Tortured Poets Department” is a beautiful collection of poetry set to music. I found this album to be very relatable. Because I truly enjoyed it, I would easily recommend it. I rate this album a 10/10, and I am really excited to see what is in store for Swift as she releases her next album called, “The Life of a Showgirl” on October 3rd of 2025.
