Stained glass
Stained glass is the coloured church window that turns plain daylight into something rich and glowing. Taylor uses it for memories that have kept their colour. In Would've, Could've, Should've the speaker has "stained glass windows in my mind": partly the church of her religious childhood, partly the colour and beauty of a relationship that still lights up when she looks back years later. (There's a real-life echo too, as the older man in that story is rumoured to have lived in a converted church with the windows still in.) In But Daddy I Love Him the same imagery turns up in the staging, setting the song inside a church.
Stained glass holds beauty that lasts in the memory: both the faith of childhood and the vivid colour of a past love, kept bright the way light stays bright through coloured glass. It can mean the church and the lost relationship at the same time, which is what makes the image work.
Appears in 1 song
Plus 1 beyond the lyric (music video or performance), not counted
“Stained glass windows in my mind”
Stained glass windows operate on multiple levels: literal stained glass from church (childhood religion), literal stained glass in John Mayer's converted-church apartment in NYC, and the beautiful colours of the relationship that remain vivid in the speaker's memory.
Stained glass appears in the Eras Tour performance, creating a church-like setting for the song. Angela & Uncle Jerry note the visual: 'The stained glass, like a church... they're like on the pews.'