Fortnight (feat. Post Malone)

“Fortnight,” track one off Taylor Swift’s eleventh studio album, The Tortured Poets Department, serves as the album’s opener.

“Fortnight” is an archaic English term that means “fourteen nights.” It serves as a reference to Taylor Swift’s ex-boyfriend, Joe Alwyn, an English actor whom she dated from 2018 to April 2023. Their subsequent breakup was first mentioned by People Magazine on April 8, 2023, in which they state “the relationship has run its course.”

“Fortnight” may also correlate with the arising rumors that occurred after the breakup, most specifically being that of Emma Laird dating Joe Alwyn due to some otherwise suggestive social media posts, with the rise in media attention occurring 12 days after Taylor’s and Joe’s breakup, almost serving with the 14 days that make a “fortnight.”

“Fortnight” may also serve as a direct antithesis to Taylor’s song “Daylight,” beyond just the usual juxtaposition between day and night. Fortnight serves as both an internal rhyme of “Daylight,” and, with it also being collaborated upon by Post Malone, it acts as a stark contrast to the solo-performed “Daylight” that concluded the 2019 album.