Cheerio, Old Chap: “So Long, London” Meaning, Explained
So Long, London, Taylor’s emotional and vulnerable track 5 from The Tortured Poets Department, is all about duality.
London represents both her ex-lover and a place she loved, and she says a sad goodbye to him, who she used to be, and a city that still holds part of her heart.
What can we learn about the central relationship from the lyrics, and what is Taylor really saying in this song?
Here’s my complete English teacher (and Londoner) analysis of So Long, London, line by line.

So Long, London by Taylor Swift
- Title: So Long, London
- Written by: Taylor Swift, Aaron Dessner
- Track: 5, The Tortured Poets Department
- Pen: Quill
- Lyrics from Genius
So Long, London Analysis: Narrative Summary
- Setting: After leaving “London” (her relationship, her home, her past self).
- Characters: Narrator (Taylor), Subject (ex-lover, “London”, “you”)
- Mood: Wistful, sad, ruminating.
- Conflict: She has to leave London and her lover to save herself.
- Inciting Incident: She gives up on making their relationship work.
- Quest: Say goodbye to him, and goodbye to her former home.
- Symbols & Metaphors: “London” & “so long, London,” “fairy lights through the mist,” “carried the weight of the rift,” “pulled him in tighter,” “spine split from carrying us up the hill,” “wet through my clothes, weary bones caught the chill,” “drill the safe,” “how much sad,” “tragedy,” “odd man out,” “founded the club,” “house by the Heath,” “CPR,” “spirit was gone,” “give you all that youth for free,” “Stitches undone,” “Two graves, one gun,” “someone,” “abandoned the ship,” “going down with it,” “white-knuckle dying grip,” “quiet resentment,” “every breath feels like rarest air,” “not sure if he wants to be there,” “how low,” “self implode”, “go be free,” “clues,” “the altar,” “sacrificed us to the gods of your bluest days,” “getting color back into my face,” “this place,” “good run,” “moment of warm sun,” “I’m not the one.”
- Lesson: Sometimes you have to give up the things you love to save yourself.
What is So Long, London About?
So Long, London is Taylor’s goodbye letter to a relationship and a city that she loved. The lyrics detail how she tried to make the central relationship work, but could never seem to make her lover happy.
The central metaphor of London represents both her former home and her former partner. In this track, she says a sad goodbye to both.
Who is So Long, London About?
This track is likely about her 6-year relationship with her former partner Joe Alwyn. Taylor moved to London to be with him in her reputation era, and famously loved the city.
But it seems that all was not well for quite some time. She describes in the lyrics how she was struggling behind the scenes to try to make her relationship work. She finally had to give up in order to save herself.
So Long, London Meaning: Line by Line
“So (So) long (Long), London (London)
So (So) long (Long), London (London)
So (So) long (Long), London (London)”
-Taylor Swift, So Long, London
The intro sounds like a church choir, and echoes the sound of church bells (or maybe wedding bells?).
London is known for its bells, but it’s not only Big Ben. Hampstead Heath has an iconic church that rings its bells on Sundays, which can be heard throughout the Heath.
Verse 1: “Fairy Lights Through The Mist”

“I saw in my mind fairy lights through the mist,” she begins in the first verse. Fairy lights are what Brits call Christmas lights.
There’s something hopeful and bright out there, but it’s covered in London fog, and she can’t ever seem to reach it (she will eventually reach it, however, in So High School).
But what else are “fairy lights through the mist?” The will-o-the-wisp, from willow. The fairy lights represent his illusive, ever-changing nature, like in willow’s: “the more that you say, the less I know / wherever you stray, I follow.”
“I kept calm,” she says, enticed by the hope of the fairy lights, “and carried the weight of the rift.” She didn’t let herself get her hopes up, and continued carrying their burdens, echoing the famous “keep calm and carry on.”
“Carried the weight of the rift” also alludes to the mythological Sisyphus, who was destined to keep pushing a boulder up the hill for eternity.
“Pulled him in tighter each time he was driftin’ away” means she tried to hold him closer, but it backfired. He drifted like the illusive will-o-the-wisp, or like an untethered ship, farther and farther away from her.
“My spine split from carrying us up the hill” also alludes to Sisyphus. She’s bearing the entire weight of their relationship – the boulder – and it breaks her body and spirit.
“Wet through my clothes,” she says, “weary bones caught the chill.” She’s drenched to the bone, either in sweat, or rain that metaphorically pours over their relationship. But she could also be wet because she nearly drowned next to his willow.
In Hamlet, Ophelia drowns next to a willow tree, and in Taylor’s willow, the willow (her lover) is the thing that saves her from drowning. But now that there’s no hope, she nearly drowns in his sadness and temperamental nature.
Now her metaphorical clothes are soaked, and her “weary bones caught the chill,” meaning she’s going hypothermic. This likely references Call it What You Want where “he built a fire just to keep me warm.” Here, he builds no fire. He lets her freeze.
“I stopped tryna make him laugh,” she says, after she realizes it’s fruitless, “stopped tryna drill the safe.” His “cascade ocean blue waves” of depression wash over him, and she can’t seem to cheer him up.
He’s a code that she can’t crack, and she tried to force her way inside with a drill. But there’s no hope: he’s uncrackable.
Chorus: “How Much Sad Did You Think I Had?”

After she’s left London and the relationship, she reflects on what happened in the chorus.
“Thinkin’, ‘How much sad did you think I had,” she asks him, “Did you think I had in me?’”
He put her through so much – pushing the boulder up the hill, nearly drowning, drilling safes – that he must have thought she had boundless energy and sadness. But she didn’t have bottomless sadness: she reached her limit. And she had to give up.
“Oh, the tragedy,” she muses. They are not a Love Story or a fairytale: they’re a Shakespearean tragedy.
“So long, London,” she says, “You’ll find someone.” London is both a city she loved and her lover: they are one and the same. She can’t have London without him, and she can’t have him without London.
She says goodbye to both.
Verse 2: “I Founded the Club She’s Heard Great Things About”

“I didn’t opt in to be your odd man out,” she says in the second verse. This alludes to a third person in the relationship, with Taylor as the third wheel. She never signed up to be bumped to third place.
“I founded the club she’s heard great things about” means she had him first: she was his first “fan club” member. Now a new member enters the chat, unaware of how much of his “fandom” was created by Taylor.
“I left all I knew,” she says, leaving her American life behind, “you left me at the house by the Heath.” After she sacrificed her entire familiar life to move to London to be with him, he left her alone once she arrived.
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Hampstead is a posh residential area of North London that several celebrities call home. In the center is the massive park Hampstead Heath, which Taylor also mentioned in London Boy. But it’s not home anymore – he left her there all alone, stranded in a foreign land.
“I stoppеd CPR, after all, it’s no use,” she says, ending her relationship resuscitation efforts. This picks up where You’re Losing Me left off: “I can’t find a pulse / My heart won’t start anymore.” (She’ll describe this death again in How Did it End?).
“The spirit was gonе, we would never come to” describes this slow death. The “spirit” slowly leaked out of their love, and they can never revive it again.
“And I’m pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free,” she says angrily. She gave him years of her life – maybe the best years of her life – and got nothing in return.
“Pissed” is a common British word for drunkenness, and “pissed away” means to waste something. She could simply be describing her anger, but could also be playing with common British phrases as a nod to her former home.
Chorus: “Two Graves, One Gun”

The previous verse ended with “And I’m pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free.” Then the chorus picks up with “for so long, London.”
For the longest time, she gave him her youth: her best years, her best self. But now she has to say goodbye while there’s still hope she can save herself.
“Stitches undone” could allude to Glitch, where she describes jumping into the relationship quickly. “Five seconds later, I’m fastening myself to you with a stitch,” she said in that track, but here, the stitches come undone. There’s nothing fastening them together anymore.
“Two graves, one gun” means that one metaphorical “bullet” killed them both. But Taylor could also be holding the gun: she buries both London and her lover in one grave. It’s two huge losses, taken out in one fell swoop.
“I’ll find someone” she assures herself. She’ll find another city and another lover, or so she hopes.
Bridge: “Every Breath Feels Like Rarest Air”

“And you say I abandoned the ship,” she says in the bridge, “But I was going down with it.” He accuses her of abandoning their relationship (the “ship”), but it was killing her to hold on. She would drown if she stayed any longer.
Taylor has used nautical and shipwreck imagery and metaphors a lot in her discography, but she is usually the turbulent waves (see evermore, willow). In willow, he’s the ship: “I’m like the water when your ship rolled in that night / rough on the surface but you cut through like a knife.”
He’s the ship that rescues her, but now the ship is going down. He’ll drag her down with him if she doesn’t abandon ship and get to safety.
“My white-knuckle dying grip” describes her death-grip on the sinking ship, “Holding tight to your quiet resentment.” The only thing she can grasp is his “quiet resentment”: there is no love left to hold onto. He only tolerates her, as the ship slowly sinks into the waves.
“And my friends said it isn’t right to be scared,” she says, “Every day of a love affair.” She was in a precarious, terrifying position the whole time. They were never sailing on a placid sea; the ship was always rocking on turbulent waves.
“Every breath feels like rarest air,” she says, “When you’re not sure if he wants to be there.” She’s holding her breath, waiting for him to stay or waiting for him to leave.
It’s never steady, calm breathing: she gasps, sometimes suffocates, and then cherishes the small moments when she can finally breathe.
3rd Chorus: “How Low Did You Think I’d Go?”

“So how much sad did you think I had,” she asks again in the chorus, “Did you think I had in me? How much tragedy?” How much sadness can one person contain? Is her sadness limitless?
Turns out, it wasn’t. There was a line, and he crossed it. She finally got out, and breathed the “rarest air” of relief.
“Just how low did you / Think I’d go ‘fore I’d self-implode?” she prods, “’Fore I’d have to go be free?” She has to freedive to meet his depths of sadness, but the pressure builds, and she won’t keep going deeper only to “self-implode.”
She shoots back to the surface “to go be free,” and can’t believe that she sunk to such depths in the first place.
Verse 3: “You Sacrificed Us to the Gods of Your Bluest Days”

“You swore that you loved me, but where were the clues?” she asks him in the third verse. She’s looking for evidence that he did actually love her. Like in Hits Different, “I trace the evidence, make it make some sense.”
“I died on the altar waitin’ for the proof” could mean she slowly died waiting for him to marry her, but it could also allude to tolerate it. “I made you my temple, my mural, my sky,” she says in that song. The altar is her lover: she worshiped him, but it was a false god.
“You sacrificed us to the gods of your bluest days” means he ruined their relationship while he was in a bad way. He wasn’t making calculated choices; he was ruled by his depressive emotions, and made hasty decisions when his mind wasn’t clear.
But while Taylor’s altar and god is him, his altar and god is sadness and depression. They’re worshiping totally different subjects; their lives ruled by different priorities.
“And I’m just getting color back into my face,” she reflects, after she got out of this deepest blue. In You’re Losing Me, she said: “my face was gray, but you wouldn’t admit that we were sick.” After she nearly died for him, she slowly starts coming back to life.
She might be better physically and emotionally, but “I’m just mad as hell ’cause I loved this place for so long.” She’s going through the steps of grief, and she’s stuck on anger.
“This place” is both London, and with her ex-lover. They’re one and the same. She “loved this place” when they were happy, but the happiness is fleeting.
Now she has to say goodbye to the good memories and the bad, as well as say goodbye to a city she loved.
Final Chorus: “A Moment of Warm Sun”

“So long, London,” she says one final time in the last chorus, “had a good run.” There were happy times here, like “a moment of warm sun.”
This fleeting moment of warmth reflects not only London’s notorious gray weather, but her lover’s depression. It only got sunny for a few moments, and the rest was gray sadness.
“But I’m not the one,” she muses. She’s not the one for him, and she’s not the one who can stick around for more of his “bluest days.” She has no more sadness left in her, and has to get out to save herself.
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The stitch is cut, and there are no more ties that bind. She buries her lover and London in “two graves” with “one gun,” and walks away for the last time.
“You’ll find someone,” she assures her lover and her city. London will find someone else to love, and Taylor will go get the color back in her cheeks with someone who isn’t bathed in blue.
So Long, London Analysis: Final Thoughts
Taylor’s track 5s are always her most vulnerable and meaningful songs on any album, and this track is no exception. She gives us a very candid, very potent look at what was really going on inside her love life.
As an American who lives in London, I love how Taylor has personified the city as a depressive and bleak landscape: it’s 100% accurate. But there’s also something magical about this city that makes living here worth it, which Taylor has also captured so precisely in this track.
It’s a gorgeous Dear John letter to her ex-city and ex-partner, and a load-bearing song on The Tortured Poets Department. She’ll circle back to these themes and emotions again and again on this album, ruminating over places lost and gained.
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
- 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
- Cassandra
- Peter
- The Bolter
- Robin
- The Manuscript