Taylor Swift fans know the superstar likes to hide messages within the lyrics of her album liner notes. By piecing together the capital letters, one finds phrases like TOBY in the lyrics to ‘Mine’ and I THOUGHT YOU GOT ME on ‘Mean.’ Swift hid the words PORTLAND OREGON within the lyrics of ‘Sparks Fly,’ her latest single from the ‘Speak Now’ album.
So what happened in Portland? Swift is notoriously mum about what or who influenced each of her songs, but by following a trail of bread crumbs one can offer a pretty good guess. The song is a love song, or an ode to someone who makes her see fireworks each time he’s around. She sings, “Drop everything now / Meet me in the pouring rain / Kiss me on the sidewalk / Take away the pain / ‘Cause I see, sparks fly whenever you smile.”
Odds are this fella has a pretty nice smile, because not many girls become weak-kneed when a man flashes a set of rotten chicklets. In a recent statement released via her record label, Swift admitted the song is about helplessly falling for the wrong person. “This is a song that I wrote a few years ago and had been working on it ever since in the last two years and just honing in on little lyrics and changing them, so it’s really been awesome to see it change over the years.”
So now the question becomes, what happened in Portland … a few years ago? “I run my fingers through your hair and watch the lights go wild / Just keep on keeping your eyes on me, it’s just wrong enough to make it feel right / Lead me up the staircase, won’t you whisper soft and slow / I’m captivated by you, baby, like a firework show.” With that lyric, the answer may not be fit for a PG-13 crowd.
The answer, if you’re willing to believe some well-informed gossip, may be that Jake Owen happened in Portland. CMT reported last year that a Taylor Swift MySpace blog post described a show Swift and Owen did together in 2006. He’s got the smile, and at 16-years-old it definitely would have been a bad idea for her to pursue the now-29-year-old Owen. Could Swift have used her school girl crush on the “Barefoot Blue Jean Night” singer as inspiration for her next big hit song?
While surely the relationship went no further than polite smiles and chit-chat, Owen was told of the coincidence. “I’m glad I’m the reason she sold a million this week,” he joked.
Source
