All of Taylor Swift’s sly digs at ex Joe Alwyn in new album The Tortured Poets Department

It’s Taylor release day! The Tortured Poets Department is officially out and that means you don’t want to be one of three people today, Matty Healy, Kim Kardashian or Joe Alwyn. Everyone is convinced thanK you aIMee is about Taylor’s feud with Kim K and Matty Healy has a whopping SIX songs about him, despite only being together for a few months.

But Joe Alwyn was in a relationship with Taylor for a massive six years. So how many songs in The Tortured Poets Department are about him and their break up? And are they messy and scathing or just downright sad? Joe Alywn has even turned his Insta comments off today to stop any Swifties from giving their very strong opinion on their break-up.

So this is every one of Taylor Swift’s apparent sly digs and references to ex Joe Alwyn in The Tortured Poets Department

So Long, London 

So obviously Taylor released Lover in 2019, which was a lot about Joe. Especially the song London Boy, given the fact that Joe is from London and Taylor spent a lot of time with him there.  Taylor also references “a house by the Heath” in the song, which many fans have suggested is a reference to the house they lived in near Hampstead Heath in London

So we can mostly assume that this song is about her break up with him. And given that it’s a track five song which are renowned for being sad on Taylor albums, boy is this one emotional.

So Long, London is also a sister song to Midnights’ You’re Losing Me, where Taylor sings about the death of her romance with Joe. She ends the song with: “Had a good run but I’m not the one, London” and I’m weeping right now.

The Tortured Poets Department 

So even though Matty Healy actually makes more of an appearance on the album than Joe does, the album name and track number two is heavily assumed to be a reference to Joe. In an interview with Variety two years ago, Joe said he was in a group chat with Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott (I need to be a part of this please) called The Tortured Man’s Club. Then for Taylor to release an album called The Tortured Poets Department? This cannot be a coincidence!

loml

loml, whilst normally standing for love of my life, actually stand for loss of my life in Taylor’s song. And so this is another one that has people convinced it’s about Joe Alwyn. People believe this song could be about Joe as in a lot of her previous music, including Lover, folklore and evermore, Taylor has talked about Joe as the “one”.

There are references to “getting married’ and building a life together in the song, which she now resents. “You shit-talked me under the table talking rings and talking cradles,” she sings in the second verse.

There are also subtle references to someone claiming he was a “reformed” man after getting with her, with lines like “Mr. Steal your girl and then make her cry,” and “the coward claimed he was a lion.” This matches up to Taylor’s earlier music about Joe which included nods to the actor’s past dating life, like Delicate’s “Do the girl’s back home touch you like I do?” and “Knew he was a killer, first time that I saw him, breaking hearts and never saying sorry,” which appears on Reputation’s “Are You Ready for It?”

I Can Do It with a Broken Heart 

And finally, Swifties have understood I Can Do It With a Broken Heart to be about Taylor trying to hold it all together after breaking up with Joe while she launched the Eras Tour. She sings: “I’m a real tough kid, I can handle my shit. They said gotta fake it ‘till you make it and baby, I did,” which people have understood as her speaking about the early days of the tour which launched less than one month after her breakup with Joe was announced.

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Related stories recommended by this writer:

• This is why everyone thinks Taylor Swift’s song thanK you aIMee is about Kim Kardashian

• All the savage Matty Healy lyrics Taylor Swift sings on The Tortured Poets Department

• Said as a Swiftie: The over-saturated dominance of Taylor Swift has finally got too much

Featured image before edits via Blitz Pictures/Shutterstock