Muse
The muse figure as the source of artistic inspiration the speaker refuses to leave behind - drawing on the classical nine muses of Greek mythology and on the Romantic tradition in which nature itself is named as muse. In Taylor's writing the muse register is deliberately multivalent: it may be a person (beloved), nature itself, the speaker's accumulated body of work, or the audience whose continued attention makes further work possible. The ambiguity is the figure's point: the muse is whatever sustains continued creation.
The indispensable source of artistic inspiration - what the speaker carries with her when she sets off into refuge or exile, and what she could not leave behind without ceasing to make. The figure's multivalence captures how artistic vocation can rest on more than one ground at once.
Appears in 1 song
“I'm setting off, but not without my muse”
The muse operates on multiple levels, it could be a person (beloved), nature itself as inspiration (a Romantic tenet), Taylor's past work and artistic integrity, or her audience/listeners. Uncle Jerry reads it as deliberately ambiguous.