What Taylor Swift and The Tortured Poets Department Teach Us About Loss

With a visit to The Tortured Poets Department, her 11th studio album, Taylor Swift explores the darkest corners of her career, examining grief and loss. Dealing with the loss of a long-term relationship so publicly isn’t relatable for everyone, but the description and feelings of despair and sadness are. A sorrowful, unintended message emerges from 31 songs on the double album: coping with loss can feel insurmountable. 

Through Swift’s perceptive lyrics, we see grief as a cutting, gaping, never-healing wound. Given her public losses and challenges, her latest album shows how the adage “time heals all wounds” perpetually reopens the gash, deepening the scar tissue. Grief also catalyzes the most poignant, sentimental creations of art, music, and life we experience. Reconciling these conflicting realities is one of grief’s many challenges. It also comforts us mortals that no one, not even a global icon, is safe from grief’s grasp.

"Tortured Poets" lacks the conciseness of Swift’s trademark pop hits and catchy hooks, demonstrating a universal truth about grief: there’s no way to summarize the mess it creates. 

Before the album’s release, Taylor organized songs in her discography into five playlists for each stage of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Naming and categorizing feelings helps us deal with grief, and creating spaces personifying each emotion is healthy and gives us a viewpoint through which to frame the music. 

Here are the five stages of grief, Taylor’s version. 

Denial (‘I Love You, It’s Ruining My Life’)

A constant, resounding hallmark of Swift’s songwriting and storytelling is her candidly sharp, devastatingly self-aware perception of her life, love, and loss. The self-awareness of “I love you, it’s ruining my life” from the album’s lead single, ‘Fortnight,’ featuring Post Malone, opens the new era with this keen insight. 

Even with a deep understanding of grief and careful planning for a loved one’s passing, we often can't escape the profound sadness that comes with loss. It is a package we can’t return, a service we didn’t sign up for. Denial appears to be our only choice. 

In particular, ‘I Hate It Here’ explores how imagination and dissociative thinking can help us cope with an upsetting and depressing stage of life. Distraction from painful periods in our lives can be helpful. 

Denial Tracks on Spotify

Anger (‘You Don’t Get To Tell Me About Sad’)

Loss and death remind us of our lack of control over our lives and how they end. Our daily decisions often give us a comforting sense of control, letting us get comfortable and relaxed in what appears to be inevitable. When this illusion shatters, we’re left reeling and covered in debris. It’s not necessarily loss itself; the sense of powerlessness makes us angry. 

“Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” is among the angriest songs on Tortured Poets. Taylor addresses previous and current critiques about herself and her candid storytelling style, ultimately declaring, “You don’t get to tell me you feel bad.” Her haunting vocals remind us that sometimes well-intended words can be more harmful than helpful. 

Anger Tracks on Spotify

Bargaining (‘Am I Allowed to Cry?’)

Bargaining generally involves making or thinking irrational statements while your brain tries to cope and rationalize with what happened. 

Bargaining is a side effect of hope, the desperate desire we innately have to make a horrific tragedy or deep sadness better, but as Taylor explains, the more desperate we are, the more we bargain. 

While Taylor poses this painful question in ‘Guilty as Sin?’ the anthology’s track 26 “The Prophecy” explores this theme as Taylor begs for a change to what she assumes is the predetermined path of her life. The song's message is clear: she’d give it all up, the fame, money, and unparalleled success, for true love to once be hers, a sorrowful plea she implores the fates to accommodate. 

Other bargaining reminiscent songs from Taylor’s discography include Lover’s track twelve, “Soon You’ll Get Better,” which features the Chicks and addresses her mother, Andrea Swift’s, cancer diagnosis and treatment. The Red-era charity single “Ronan.” is a tribute to a three-year-old fan, Ronan Thompson, with lyrics adapted from his mother’s blog about his cancer treatments. (Maya Thompson lost her son, Ronan, three days before his fourth birthday.) 

Bargaining Tracks on Spotify

Depression (‘Old Habits Die Screaming’)

Multiple descriptions of traditional grieving experiences float along various verses and bridges on The Anthology as Taylor opens the double album with “The Black Dog” and moves “through the world with the heartbroken.” We hear mentions of crying in public places, being too depressed to get out of bed, and having trouble sleeping, all for her to admit “I can’t pretend I understand” on ‘How Did It End?’

The emptiness of loss is among the most challenging aspects to cope with as we face frequent reminders of the gap or hole that’s left in our lives. The memories of our happiness can come in waves, leaving us wondering why we chased joy in the first place. The reality is that anything we care about can be lost, and anything worth losing is usually worth caring about. It can make depression feel unavoidable, and coping with loss even harder. Yet, the fearless exploration of how the most profound lovers’ romance splinters, how the liveliest people cry the hardest, and how everyone we love will die motivates us to get out of bed in the morning. It’s the daily acceptance of this fact that makes life valuable. 

Depression Tracks on Spotify 

Acceptance (‘I Can Do It With a Broken Heart’)

The album concludes with a powerful note in “The Manuscript,” a reflective song that invites listeners to revisit past experiences and process painful emotions as a healing practice. As life goes on, we continue to recontextualize past losses in the light of the present, bridging the gap between who we were then and who we are now. Often, the two appear incompatible. 

Taylor’s new Eras Tour TPPD setlist demonstrates this stark contrast. Taylor concludes the new tour section with “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart,” a self-referential song about her life over the past year while on the Eras Tour. Her onstage performance mirrors the ideas of the song, publicly smiling and singing for hours on every tour date while privately suffering. By including it as part of the show setlist, she reclaims the original pain of the song for herself and her fans.

Acceptance Tracks on Spotify 

‘Step Into the Daylight, and Let it Go’

What Taylor can teach us about loss is this: it ultimately moves us forward. Losses of varying types and degrees propel Taylor’s career. Her album Red, lost the 2012 Grammy Album of the Year award but resulted in a 2014 Grammy Album of Year win for 1989, one of her biggest commercial successes. Signing with a new record label ushered in new levels of success with folklore (her third Grammy Album of the Year win) and evermore. The record-breaking success of the Eras Tour, new-found billionaire status, and new relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce follow the end of her long-term relationship with Joe Alwyn. 

Nothing prepares us for the weight of loss, but the legacy of those we love and who loved us lives in how we remember, talk, laugh, and sing about them. Through the art we make and embrace to represent their memory, they never leave us. 

Leah Mize is a Tampa-based freelance writer and Taylor Swift historian. She graduated magna cum laude with a BA in journalism from The University of Tampa, and you can find her wandering the aisles of the only Barnes & Noble in your hometown.