Taylor Swift Reveals Mom Andrea Swift’s Reaction to NSFW Lyrics on “Wood”
Taylor Swift may have to knock on wood that Andrea Swift won’t catch on to the real meaning behind her racy lyrics.
When the Grammy winner released The Life of a Showgirl Oct. 3, fans were shocked to find her song “Wood” features many lyrics alluding to a certain body part of Taylor’s fiancé, Travis Kelce. However, the singer emphasized the importance of the double meanings in the song, noting that some unknowing listeners—like her mom—don’t pick up on the raunchy, explicit lyrics.
“She thinks that the song is about superstitions, which it absolutely is,” the Grammy winner joked on SiriusXM’s Morning Mash Up Oct. 6. “That’s the joy of the double entendre. You can read that song for people, and it just goes right over their heads.”
She noted, “You see in that song what you want to see in that song.”
The repeated lyric “I ain’t got to knock on wood” sounds innocent enough, and her mention of falling stars and black cats prove the song is indeed about superstitions, but other lyrics point a different direction.
While some references like “magic wand” can still fly over listeners’ heads, others are hard to miss, such as: “Redwood tree / It ain’t hard to see / His love was the key / That opened my thighs.”
But even if may have been difficult for Andrea to ignore that last line, Taylor explained in a video the song isn’t only about her intimate life with her husband-to-be.
Jamie Squire/Getty Images
“It’s a love story,” the 35-year-old said in an Amazon Music explanation. “[It’s] about using, as a plot device, popular superstitions [and] good luck charms, bad luck charms and all these different ways we have decided things are good luck or bad luck—like knocking on wood and seeing a black cat.”
She then added with a slightly sarcastic tone to her voice, “That is the way I’ve explored this very, very sentimental love song.”
For more insight on Taylor’s Life of a Showgirl lyrics, read on.
Mert Alas & Marcus Piggot
1: “The Fate of Ophelia”
The opening song on Taylor Swift‘s The Life of a Showgirl references the character Ophelia from William Shakespeare‘s Hamlet, who faces a tragic fate.
According to the song’s lyrics, Taylor “might’ve drowned in the melancholy” if she hadn’t been saved by her true love.
“I heard you calling / On the megaphone,” Taylor sings. “You wanna see me all alone.”
The lyrics appear to be a nod to Travis Kelce calling Taylor out on his New Heights podcast for not meeting him at her Eras Tour, which is how their romance began.
“I swore loyalty to me, myself and I,” the lyrics continue. “Right before you lit my sky up.”
Before meeting Travis, Taylor was fresh off a breakup from Matty Healy, having declared herself one of the “independent girlies” in July 2023.
But after Travis went to her concert in Kansas City that same month, sparks began to fly.
Now, Taylor’s fiancé is even in on her Easter egg game, teasing “The Fate of Ophelia” lyrics on Instagram back in July. (Had some adventures this offseason,” he captioned pics with Taylor, adding, “Kept it [100].”)
How does that connect to Taylor’s song? Well, as the lyrics go, “You dug me out of my grave and saved my heart from the fate of Ophelia / Keep it one hundred.”
Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images
2: “Elizabeth Taylor”
Taylor gives a nod to another famous showgirl, the late Elizabeth Taylor, in the second song on the album, even naming Elizabeth’s favorite places, Paris’ Plaza Athénée as well as Los Angeles’ Musso & Frank’s.
In the lyrics, Taylor also draws parallels between her and the Cleopatra actress. Like Taylor today, Elizabeth often made headlines for everything from her love life to her dazzling outfits.
But, as Taylor notes in her song, “Oftentimes it doesn’t feel so glamorous to be me.”
Mert Alas & Marcus Piggot
3: “Opalite”
In upbeat “Opalite,” which Travis previously revealed as his favorite Showgirl song, Taylor references their love story.
After weathering her fair share of lightning strikes in relationships, now Taylor’s sky is calm, it’s opalite, with Travis.
“I had written down the word opalite because I learned that it’s actually a manmade opal,” she revealed on Capital radio. “Travis’ birthstone is opal, so that I’ve always fixed on that, I’ve always loved that stone.”
As for the meaning behind the synthetic glass gemstone? “I thought it was a cool metaphor that it’s a manmade opal and happiness can also be manmade, too.”
However, it’s not without some bite, as Swifties think Taylor shaded Travis’ ex Kayla Nicole in the lyrics by hinting the NFL player felt kind of like a prop in her social media pics.
“You couldn’t understand it / Why you felt alone,” she sings, seemingly to him. “You were in it for real / She was in her phone.”
The song goes on, “You were just a pose / And don’t we try to love love / And give it all we got / You finally left the table / And what a simple thought / You’re starving ’til you’re not.”
Amy Sussman/Getty Images & Sean Gallup/Getty Images
4: “Father Figure”
While Taylor, Max Martin and Shellback are credited as Showgirl writers, the late George Michael receives a posthumous credit on “Father Figure” because the song includes an interpolation of George’s 1987 track of the same name.
George’s team even gave their stamp of approval, writing on Instagram Oct. 2, “Thank you @taylorswift for including George in such a special moment.”
Fans speculate that the first half of the song is written from the perspective of Big Machine Records’ Scott Borchetta, who sold Taylor’s masters to Scooter Braun, before switching to Taylor’s perspective on her reclaiming them.
Taylor herself admitted that the song was “written in character.”
“That was a fun one to write,” she said on BBC 1 Radio. “It’s a very different way of using the idea of a father figure to king of talk about power, power structures, and the flipping of the power dynamics.”
Plus, she’s “pretty proud” of a specific NSFW line about making deals with the devil because “my d–k’s bigger.”
Kevin Winter/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
5: “Eldest Daughter”
We’ve reached track five on Showgirl, known to be the spot on an album that Taylor reserves for her most heartbreaking songs.
In “Eldest Daughter,” Taylor, who Andrea Swift and Scott Swift welcomed before also becoming parents to Austin Swift, sings about navigating all of life’s highs and lows, but always sticking with the ones she loves.
“Cause I’m not a bad bitch / And this isn’t savage / And I’m never gonna let you down,” the lyrics note. “I’m never gonna leave you out / So many traitors / Smooth operators / But I’m never gonna break that vow.”
Taylor Hill/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
6: “Ruin the Friendship”
Track six on Showgirl tells a story of regret over a romance that didn’t quite get off the ground. The lyrics are filled with nostalgia, “Have fun, it’s prom / Wilted corsage dangles from my wrist / Over his shoulder I catch a glimpse / And see…You looking at me / And it was not an invitation / But as the 50 Cent song played / Should’ve kissed you anyway.”
Taylor’s longtime best friend Abigail Anderson (of “Fifteen” fame) gets a nod in these heartbreaking lyrics of loss: “When I left school, I lost track of you / Abigail called me with the bad news / Goodbye, and we’ll never know why.”
Fans think the tragic song was written about her late school friend Jeff Lang, who died in 2010 and is believed to have inspired her prior song “Forever Winter.”
“I didn’t know / You were breakin’ down / I’d fall to pieces on the floor / If you weren’t around,” she sings