First Stone Thrown: “Cassandra” Song Meaning, Explained Line by Line

Taylor Swift’s Cassandra uses Greek mythology metaphors to describe her feeling of being cursed in her life and career. 

But this song goes much deeper than simple mythology references: it describes a major trauma in Taylor’s life, and what the consequences were. 

What do the lyrics mean, what incidents is she talking about, and what’s the overall message? 

Here’s my full English teacher’s explanation of Taylor’s Cassandra song meaning, line by line. 

Cassandra by Taylor Swift

• Title: “Cassandra”
• Written by: Aaron Dessner, Taylor Swift
• Track: 27, The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology 
• Pen: Quill
• Lyrics from Genius

Cassandra Lyrics Meaning: Narrative Summary

• Setting: Looking back on a past transgression against her. 
• Characters: Narrator (Taylor, comparing herself to “Cassandra”), subject (“they”, people who tried to silence her). 
• Mood: Sad, karmic, prophetic. 
• Conflict: She knew the truth, but was silenced. 
• Inciting Incident: “I got the call” (found out some terrible news). 
• Quest: Let everyone know that she tried to reveal the truth, but was silenced. 
• Similes, Metaphors & Deeper Meanings: “Cassandra,” “new house,” “placing daydreams,” “patching up a crack along the wall,” “pass it,” “lose track of what I’m saying,” “got the call,” “first stone’s thrown,” “in the streets there’s a raging riot,” “burn the bitch,” “when the truth comes out, it’s quiet,” “they killed Cassandra first ‘cause she feared the worst,” “tried to tell the town,” “filled my cell with snakes,” “do you believe me now?”, “in my tower,” “weaving nightmares,” “twisting all my smiles into snarls,” “what doesn’t kill you makes you aware,” “becomes who you are,” “set my life in flames,” “they knew,” “I was onto somethin’,” “family,” “pure greed,” “Christian chorus line,” “blood’s thick, but nothing like a payroll,” “spared a prayer for my soul,” “mark my words,” “mourning warning,” “no one heard,” “I patched up the crack,” “when I lost it all,” “not a single word was heard,” “it’s so quiet.” 
• Lesson: People don’t want to hear the truth. 

What is Cassandra About? 

In Cassandra, Taylor compares herself to the mythological Greek priestess, who was blessed with the gift of prophecy, but cursed to never be believed. 

The lyrics describe a truth that Taylor was trying to tell the public, but she was silenced before she could spread the word. 

Who is Cassandra About? 

Cassandra is likely about Taylor herself, and the central metaphor compares her to a prophetic – but cursed – Greek mythological priestess. 

Taylor has never revealed who or what the central conflict in the song is about, but there are two major conflicts in her professional life that she could allude to: Snakegate, or the masters heist.

We can speculate, but we may never know unless she chooses to tell us. 

Cassandra Lyrical Analysis: Line by Line

“I was in my new house placing daydreams,” she opens in the first verse. The “new house” symbolizes a new or fresh era of her life. She’s moved out of an old space, and into a new one. 

She’s “placing daydreams,” meaning she’s plotting the narrative of what she wants this new life to look like. 

This recalls a line from peace: “you paint dreamscapes on the wall.” In that song, her lover was the one “placing daydreams,” but here, she’s doing it herself. 

She was “Patching up the crack along the wall,” symbolizing something broken that needs to be healed. Is the “crack” where the lover’s daydreams from peace shattered? 

“I pass it and lose track of what I’m saying,” she says, neglecting this wound that needs attention. She loses track of her daydreams, and doesn’t get to voice what she wants her new life to look like. 

“’Cause that’s where I was when I got the call,” she says, getting earth-shattering news while she was plotting her fresh start. 

To “get the call” usually refers to a death notification, and it’s used similarly here. She hears something on the phone that tears her apart. 

1st Pre-Chorus & Chorus: “When the First Stone’s Thrown”

“When the first stone’s thrown, there’s screamin’,” she says, alluding to John 8:7: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.” 

In this biblical allegory, Jesus defends an “adulteress” who would be stoned to death as punishment. The “first stone” – Jesus says – should be thrown by someone who is morally superior or more pure than the adulteress, and very few (if any) people are. 

This is where the phrase “people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones” comes from, and that’s how Taylor uses it here (and also in my tears ricochet). She’s being accused by imperfect people, trying to “stone” her to death for being human. 

But the violence only escalates: “In the streets, there’s a raging riot.” Now more people are coming after her. The “streets” are not literal streets; she’s likely describing the world of media or social media, all coming after her. 

“When it’s “Burn the bitch,” they’re shrieking,” she says, painting herself as a witch being hunted, like in mad woman and I Did Something Bad. 

🪶🤍 Are you a tortured poet? Find out with my TTPD Lyrics Quiz! 🤍🪶

“When the truth comes out, it’s quiet,” she says. This has all been one big misunderstanding, but when people realize they’ve been targeting her for no reason, they don’t apologize or make amends. They just shut up. 

“So, they killed Cassandra first ’cause she feared the worst,” she says, pulling in the central metaphor, “And tried to tell the town.” 

Cassandra was a Trojan priestess in Greek mythology. She was blessed with the power of prophecy, but cursed to never be believed. The townspeople and other gods, therefore, saw her as “mad,” spouting nonsensical prophecies. 

She predicted the fall of Troy, and tried to warn everyone. They didn’t listen, and Cassandra was killed after Troy fell. So who was the real “mad” one: Cassandra, or the people who punished her for telling the truth? 

By using the allegory of Cassandra, Taylor is saying she knew the truth, and tried to spread the word. But they “stoned” her, and tried to “kill” her, because she tried to tell the truth. They “killed” her to silence her. 

“So they filled my cell with snakes,” she says, calling back to the imagery of her reputation era. She’s imprisoned to be silenced, and in her cell, they either torture her with venomous snakes (like a medieval torture method), or surround her with two-faced people. 

Yes, this could allude to Snakegate and the Kim/Kanye saga. The “truth” could be the real recording of Taylor not agreeing to Kanye’s lyrics, and they metaphorically “killed” her to silence her from revealing the truth. 

But I think this song goes way deeper than describing the scuffle with Kimye. 

Why? #1: I think Taylor has already walked a well-worn path over Snakegate in her songs (see This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things, Look What You Made Me Do, I Did Something Bad, I Forgot That You Existed, et al). 

And #2: The Cassandra metaphor goes deeper than simply correcting a lie. It seems to be a deep truth, that’s central to who Taylor is as a person, as we’ll learn later on in the song. 

“I regret to say,” she says, closing out the first chorus, “Do you believe me now?” This is basically saying ‘I told you so.’ She was telling the truth the whole time.

Verse 2: “I Was in My Tower Weaving Nightmares”

“I was in my tower weaving nightmares,” she says in the second verse. She’s secluded somewhere, possibly “locked away” in a tower like a princess. She also used towers in The Albatross, with “Locked me up in towers”. 

In her tower or prison, she’s “weaving nightmares.” She’s plotting revenge on those that put her there, “Twisting all my smiles into snarls.” What was a pretty pageant smile has now morphed into a vengeful sneer. 

Like the villain in happiness: “when did your winning smile / Begin to look like a smirk?” She was once the princess, and now she’s the evil witch plotting her revenge. 

“They say, ‘What doesn’t kill you makes you aware’,” she says, twisting the meaning of the proverb “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” 

“What happens if it becomes who you are?” she asks rhetorically. What didn’t “kill her” was being silenced. Is she now forever silent? Or is she now forever seeking revenge? 

The Cassandra allegory repeats, then she says: “So they set my life in flames, I regret to say.” Like the witch they believed she was, they tried to burn her down. The only thing they succeeded in killing was her “life”, and not her body. 

But who is “they”? The “town,” that she tried to warn. Like the people of Troy, they killed Cassandra for telling the truth, and killed Taylor because she was about to tell the truth. 

Remember “I pass it and lose track of what I’m saying” from the first verse? She never got to speak her truth, because her world fell apart. 

What was this grand truth that Taylor was about to reveal? It’s not a truth about someone else, it’s a truth about her “daydreams” that she never got to finish manifesting. 

In other words, it’s personal, not professional. 

Bridge: “Blood’s Thick, But Nothin’ Like a Payroll”

“They knew, they knew, they knew the whole time,” she says in the bridge, “That I was onto somethin’.” The “town” – Hollywood, the public, the music industry – knew that she held this big truth, and she was about to reveal it. 

“The family, the pure greed, the Christian chorus line,” she says, “They all said nothin’.” 

But who is “the family”? The Kardashians? That fits with “the pure greed” and the “Christian chorus line” (the Kardashians have a money-making machine…church). 

But “the Christian chorus line” could also allude to any faux-pious people of the world. A “chorus line” is people who perform, and here, she means it as people who “perform” Christianity, but don’t really practice Christian values. 

🪶🤍 Are you a tortured poet? Find out with my TTPD Lyrics Quiz! 🤍🪶

“Blood’s thick,” she says, alluding to the colloquial “blood is thicker than water,” “but nothin’ like a payroll.” She means that family is important, but this particular family is more after money. They’ll put greed over grace any day of the week. 

“Bet they never spared a prayer for my soul,” she says of the faux-Christians. But to ‘pray for one’s soul’ either means they’ve died, or they’re a ”sinner.” 

Here, it could mean that they either tried to “kill” her, then never worried about how it would affect her, or that they convicted her as a “sinner”, but gave zero shits about the implications. 

“You can mark my words that I said it first,” she says, “In a mourning warning, no one heard.” 

‘I was the very first person to try to say this,’ she seems to say, ‘but you didn’t listen, because it came from me, the mad woman.’

But what’s a “mourning warning”? She’s warning that the death of something is coming, like Cassandra predicts the fall of Troy. But what’s this big death that’s looming? 

Whatever her prophecy is, no one believes her. She doesn’t get to be the one to tell people, because no one is listening. She just dies inside instead. 

Verse 3: “That’s Where I Was When I Lost it All”

“I patched up the crack along the wall,” she says in the first verse, circling back to the setting of the first verse, but now (I think) in a different timeline. 

This time, she gets to finally fix what’s broken, and doesn’t skip over it because she gets distracted. She’s going back to what life was like before she got the first call, repairing old wounds. 

This recalls a line from it’s time to go: “That old familiar body ache / The snaps from the same little breaks in your soul.” The wall is her soul, which she has to keep repairing. 

But then she gets distracted again from tending to old wounds: “I pass it and lose track of what I’m saying / ‘Cause that’s where I was when I lost it all.” 

My theory is that this is a second wound; a second stone thrown. The first time, they tried to “kill” her. But this time, she loses everything that’s dear to her. 

Outro: “It’s So Quiet”

The post-chorus repeats portions of the bridge: “I was onto somethin’,” she reassures herself, “They all said nothin’.” She knew some deep truth – about herself or her world – but was quickly shut down from saying it aloud. 

“Blood’s thick but nothin’ like a payroll,” she repeats, “Bet they never spared a prayer for my soul.” But this time, we have to look deeper. 

Who else has a family business, and who is on Taylor’s payroll? Who else would be interested in silencing her, to potentially not lose a lot of money? 

🪶🤍 Are you a tortured poet? Find out with my TTPD Lyrics Quiz! 🤍🪶

“You can mark my words that I said it first,” she says of this silenced truth, “In a mourning warning, no one heard.” Something big was coming – the death or rebirth of something in her life – but no one wants to own up to the truth. 

“No one heard,” she says in the last line, “not a single word was heard.” 

What was the word that she was trying to say? We may never know. But it was huge, and I think much bigger than ‘the Kardashians are terrible.’ 

I have some theories, but it’s all just speculation. Like Cassandra, silenced for speaking her truth, we may never know what Taylor was about to say.

Until she’s no longer “silenced,” we can only surmise what this big news may have been. 

Cassandra Meaning: Final Thoughts 

This song is a twisting, turning labyrinth of hidden meanings and alternate interpretations. What you think it means is entirely up to you, and we may never know the full truth unless Taylor explicitly reveals it. 

If you surmise it’s about Snakegate, you could be entirely correct. If you surmise it’s about the happenings of the Lover era, you could be entirely correct. 

Taylor is the only one who knows for sure, and – like Cassandra – the prophetic truth-teller may be long dead and buried. 

More Songs From The Tortured Poets Department

• Stevie Nicks’ TTPD Prologue Poem
• TTPD Epilogue Poem “In Summation”
• Fortnight
• The Tortured Poets Department
• My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys
• Down Bad
• So Long, London
• But Daddy I Love Him
• Fresh Out The Slammer
• Florida!!!
• Guilty As Sin?
• Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?
• I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)
• Loml
• I Can Do It With A Broken Heart
• The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived
• The Alchemy
• Clara Bow
• The Black Dog
• Imgonnagetyouback
• The Albatross
• Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus
• How Did it End?
• So High School 
• I Hate it Here
• thanK you aIMee
• I Look in People’s Windows
• The Prophecy
• Peter
• The Bolter
• Robin
• The Manuscript