The vagueness of desire in Taylor Swift’s “Teardrops On My Guitar” (2006)

The first verse of Taylor Swift's "Teardrops On My Guitar" (2006) ends in vagueness: "Drew looks at me / I fake a smile so he won't see / That I want and I'm needing / Everything that we should be." The teenager doesn't name what she wants from Drew more specifically than that. "Everything" means being a couple: spending time together, going on dates, and seeing themselves and being seen by others as together. But that public side of romance also has a private side, where romantic desire is physical and sexual. The teenager may veil this physical undercurrent of desire in euphemism and abstraction, but its energy is still present. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 9 February 2024)