I'm Choosing You, Taylor! Thank You So Much @folkaylores For Putting This Together And Sharing. I Don't

I'm choosing you, Taylor! Thank you so much @folkaylores for putting this together and sharing. I don't have JackOLantern's way with words. I love and support Taylor and I am so appreciative of everything she has given us over the last two decades.

🎃The JackOLantern Anon Connections In You’re Losing me🌙

To me, this song tells a similar story to the one our mysterious JackOLantern Anon was telling. The messy, painfully human story behind the public persona. The raw and vulnerable people-pleasing pain Taylor has experienced by being in the closet as a famous person.

I’m spiraling about this new song, and in awe of her brutal honesty in the lyrics. The first thing I thought of was JackOLantern, and aside from some broader themes overlapping, there are some specific phrases and parallels that I NEED to get off my chest.

@spade-riddles

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🎃 Message 1: “In a panic, you drag your foot on the ground to stop, stop, stop.“

🌙 You’re Losing me: “Stop, stop, stop. You’re losing me.” (Around 4:20)

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🎃 Message 2:  “But after all this time, you decide you’d like to land softly, rather than crash in a tangle of broken limbs and fiery shock. Dear reader, I’m sure this tale has raised a question…? Why would someone you believe to have wings need a parachute? “

🌙 “I’m getting tired even for a phoenix. Always rising from the ashes, mending all her gashes “

This one has me shook. It’s a direct call and response. Also, “Mending all her gashes” calls back to King Of My Heart “My broken bones are mending.” And in JackOLantern’s message, they reference both fire and broken limbs/bones. PLUS, on the new CD, You’re Losing Me comes right after Dear Reader…I’m processing…

Additionally,

🎃 Message 10: “You place your hand on the doorknob, the metal cold against your fiery skin.”

once again using the word “fiery”, this time to refer to the protagonist’s skin…almost like she’s a…phoenix fresh from the ashes….

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🎃 Message 3: “You have frozen in this moment of indecision. But your hesitation was a decision all its own.“

🌙 “And the air is thick with loss and indecision. I know my pain is such an imposition.“

🌙 “Lose something, babe, risk something. (You’re losing me) Choose something, babe, I got nothing.“

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🎃 Message 4: “…there is a human heart that beats red and hot and furious.” 

🎃 Message 10: “Your heart beats red and hot and furious in your chest.“

🎃 Message 9: “And most importantly, they will know about the human heart. The flawed, scarred, angry, grateful, nonsensical heart.”

🌙 “I can’t find a pulse, my heart won’t start anymore.“

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🎃 Message 4: “Sometimes those emotions don’t line up with what is so easily seen. It takes a lifetime to master the art of biting your tongue until it bleeds, all while feeding the world a blinding smile. “

🌙 “I gave you all my best me’s, my endless empathy, and all I did was bleed as I tried to be the bravest soldier [… ] A pathological people pleaser, who only wanted you to see her.”

I mean….just………wow……

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🎃 Message 9: “The one that questions everything, but mostly it questions if the world it has grimaced through so many smiles for would love it for what it truly is.”

🌙 “And I wouldn’t marry me either. A pathological people pleaser, who only wanted you to see her.” (I just had to put this lyric again, because I feel like it sums up…everything.)

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🎃 Message 4:  “Think of these messages as smoke signals. “

🎃 Message 10: “You smile at the signal as your feet squash the forest carpet of clovers and daisies.“

🎃 Message 9: “You’re sick of having to dilute everything so far beyond recognition.“

🌙 “I sent you signals and bit my nails down to the quick.“

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🎃 Message 5: “But you have never been one to lay your armor down. When you fail, you fail gloriously. When you go, you go kicking and screaming.“

🌙 “All I did was bleed as I tried to be the bravest soldier. Fighting in only your army, frontlines, don’t you ignore me.“

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🎃 Message 8: “Lightning crackles in the sky, reflecting your emotions exactly.“

🌙 “Every morning I glared at you with storms in my eyes.”

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🎃 Message 10: “The best and worst part of it all - the lock lies broken, scorched, down on the ground.”

🌙 “And all I did was bleed as I tried to be the bravest soldier, fighting in only your army, frontlines, don’t you ignore me.”

The Great War: “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.”

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🎃 Message 10: “Insecurity and hope pound in your ears in tune with your heart beat. Never in your wildest dreams did you actually believe you would arrive here.”

🌙: This song literally samples her heartbeat as an instrument, just like Wildest Dreams……..I’m speechless. This song….about her deepest insecurities…..

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🎃 Message 10: “Who doesn’t love a good key change?”

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🎃 Message 10: “With the deepest exhale of your life so far, you slowly twist the handle.”

🌙: Song literally opens with her exhaling/sighing loudly into the mic.

🌙:  “Remember looking at this room, we loved it ‘cause of the light. Now, I just sit in the dark and wonder if it’s time. Do I throw out everything we built or keep it?” 

This lyric from You’re Losing me feels so much like she is contemplating leaving the closet. This song in general screams to me that it is about her human experience being closeted, and I believe that the “you” she keeps referring to in the song is her fans/general public who have refused to see her desperate attempts to be understood for who she is throughout the years. 

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🌙 “You say you don’t understand, and I say, ’I know you don't’. We thought a cure would come through in time, now I fear it won’t.”

One of the biggest themes in 🎃’s messages is the concept of time. Running out of time. Time being cut short. To me this line feels like she has waited and waited for a time in her career to come out. To boil the frog slowly enough that everyone would basically know before she ever had to say anything explicitly. Or maybe even for the homophobia and denial in her audience to die out over time. This line feels like her realizing that despite her endless messaging, signaling, and practically begging people to see the real her behind her sparkly persona…people still don’t get it. And because they still don’t get it, she is going to have to come out to ever be free. She will have to face adversity from her own fans, she will have to look their homophobia in the eye. She’s going to have to do it before she is “ready”. Before the world is “ready”. 

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Aside from being a stunning, beautiful song, this is some of her rawest, most vulnerable expression yet. I know the deeper meaning, and queer overtones will go over a lot of people’s heads…preferring to credit a relationship with a man for this song over Taylor’s own deeply personal experiences. But I love you, Taylor. I see you. You won’t lose everything by coming out. As JackOLantern might say, we see you, we see you, we see you.