Released on April 20, Taylor Swift's new album, The Tortured Poets Department, contains more than a few surprises: lyrical shout-outs to Patti Smith, Charlie Puth and Dylan Thomas; the phrase "F--k me up, Florida"; and, of course...the surprise release of 15 bonus tracks mere hours after the album dropped. But perhaps the most surprising is the inclusion of a poem written by Stevie Nicks, which appears as an opening prelude on the physical version of the LP.
Swift and Nicks duetted at the Grammy Awards in 2010.
Nicks and Swift famously duetted on Fleetwood Mac's "Rhiannon" at the Grammy Awards in 2010, and remained friends in the years following. Just last year, Nicks offered words of thanks to Swift for her song "You're on Your Own, Kid," which Nicks said helped her in the months following the death of her longtime Fleetwood Mac bandmate Christine McVie in late 2022.
“Thank you to Taylor Swift for doing this thing for me, and that is writing a song called ‘You’re On Your Own, Kid,’” Nicks said. “That is the sadness of how I feel. As long as Chris was, even on the other side of the world, we didn’t have to talk on the phone. We really weren’t phone buddies. Then we would go back to Fleetwood Mac, and we would walk in and it would be like ‘little sister, how are you?’ It was like never a minute had passed, never an argument in our entire 47 years.”
Here's Nicks' Tortured Poets poem in full, followed by a bit of verse from Swift, which ends the album.
For T and me… by Stevie Nicks
He was in love with her
Or at least she thought so
She was broken hearted
Maybe he was too
Neither of them knew.
She was way too hot to handle
He was way too high to try
He couldn’t even see her
He wouldn’t open his eyes
She was on her way to the stars
He didn’t say goodbye
She looked back from her future
And shed a few tears
He looked into his past
And actually felt fear.
For both of them
The answers would never be
Ever clear
Don’t ask questions now
Do that later
She brings joy
He brings Shakespeare
It’s almost a tragedy
Says she
Don’t endanger me
Don’t endanger me
He really can’t answer her
He’s afraid of her
He’s hiding from her
And he knows that he’s hurting her
She tells the truth
She writes about it
She’s an informer
He’s an X-lover
There’s nothing there for her
She’s already gone
There’s nothing that can stop her
She was just flying
thru the clouds
Where he saw her
She was just making her way
To the stars
When he lost her…
"She tells the truth / She writes about it / She's an informer' Nicks wrote.
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In Summation: Summary Poem by Taylor Swift
At this hearing
I stand before my fellow members
of the Tortured Poets Department
With a summary of my findings
A debrief, a detailed rewinding
For the purpose of warning
For the sake of reminding
As you might all unfortunately recall
I had been struck with a case
of a restricted humanity
Which explains my plea here today
of temporary insanity
You see, the pendulum swings
Oh, the chaos it brings
Leads the caged beast to do
the most curious things
Lovers spend years denying what’s ill fated
Resentment rotting away
galaxies we created
Stars placed and glued
meticulously by hand
next to the ceiling fan
Tried wishing on comets.
Tried dimming the shine.
Tried to orbit his planet.
Some stars never align.
And in one conversation, I tore down the whole sky
Spring sprung forth with dazzling freedom hues
Then a crash from the skylight
Bursting through
Something old, someone hallowed,
who told me he could be brand new
And so I was out of the oven
And into the microwave
Out of the slammer and into a tidal wave
How gallant to save the empress
from her gilded tower
Swinging a sword he could barely lift
But loneliness struck at that fateful hour
Low hanging fruit on his wine stained lips
He never even scratched the surface
of me.
None of them did.
“In summation, it was not a love affair!”
I screamed while bringing my fists
to my coffee ringed desk
It was a mutual manic phase.
It was self harm.
It was house and then cardiac arrest.
A smirk creeps onto this poet’s face
Because it’s the worst men that I write best.
And so I enter into evidence
My tarnished coat of arms
My muses, acquired like bruises
My talismans and charms
The tick, tick, tick of love bombs
My veins of pitch black ink
All’s fair in love and poetry
Sincerely,
The Chairman
of The Tortured Poets Department
