Here's Why Taylor Name-Drops Dylan Thomas & Patti Smith In "TTPD"

Taylor Swift may be one of the biggest names in modern music, but she sure does love to name-drop other people. Her newest album, The Tortured Poets Department, is chock-full of references to famous folks — from fellow musicians to an iconic silent film star from Old Hollywood. But one of her most intriguing references to real people on the new album (besides Aimee/Kim, perhaps) is her double-reference to Dylan Thomas and Patti Smith on the album’s title track.

ICYMI: Dylan Thomas and Patti Smith are artists — like, super famous ones. Thomas was a Welsh poet and writer who lived in the early 1900s and is probably best known for his poem “Do not go gentle into that good night.” Smith, who is still alive, is an American singer/songwriter, author, poet, and painter (talk about a multi-hyphenate). You’ve probably heard her punk rock album Horses or her song “Because the Night,” which she co-wrote with Bruce Springsteen.

In her song “The Tortured Poets Department,” the second track that shares the name of the album it was released on, Swift references both artists back-to-back in the same line. She sings: “You’re not Dylan Thomas, I’m not Patti Smith.”

So uh, what does she mean by this double-reference? Let’s break it down.

To unpack the meaning of the reference, let’s first look at the lyrics surrounding it:

I laughed in your face and said / “You’re not Dylan Thomas, I’m not Patti Smith / This ain’t the Chelsea Hotel, we’rе modern idiots”

So first of all, it sounds like Swift is recounting a time when she made this reference to someone else, seemingly poking fun at her and whoever she’s talking to. (Ahem, Matty Healy?) She’s comparing them to two great artists from previous generations, noting how they’re silly compared to Thomas and Smith. Basically, she’s saying, “Chill, it’s not that serious; we’re not that deep.”

The self-deprecating comparison between Smith and Thomas is right at home in this song, which starts off with Swift making fun of her lover for using a typewriter: You left your typewriter at my apartment / Straight from the tortured poets department / I think some things I never say / Like, “Who uses typewriters anyway?”

Basically, the song has a laugh at how Swift and her unnamed partner are taking themselves so seriously — I mean: Sometimes I wonder if you’re gonna screw this up with me, but you told Lucy you’d kill yourself if I ever leave / And I had said that to Jack about you so I felt seen — and that despite how viscerally they may be feeling and expressing their emotions, they’re no Thomas or Smith.