The Sweetest Torture: Untangling the Web of Love and Hatred in “lacy”

She’s beautiful and you love her, which makes you hate yourself, which makes you hate her.

Do I want to be her or be with her? Olivia Rodrigo explores the complexity of this age-old question that queer girls face in “lacy.” Because of the way that patriarchal society pits women against each other and reinforces unattainable beauty standards, it’s not difficult to conflate genuine attraction with jealousy, and vice versa, especially when dealing with internalized homophobia and insecurity. Rodrigo wrote this song as a poem initially, which makes it especially suited for literary analysis, with intentional word choices, rhyme schemes and stanza patterns. These create a world of possible meanings and interpretations, and allow the song to bring different stories to life. With its expressions of sapphic yearning, “lacy” blurs the lines between admiration, infatuation, and envy, suggesting that perhaps all of these feelings and more can coexist in a relationship.

Heaven and Hell

The first verse introduces Lacy and sets up the AAB rhyme scheme and tone reminiscent of a nursery rhyme: “Lacy, oh Lacy, skin like puff pastry / Aren’t you the sweetest thing on this side of Hell?” The repetition of her name in the first line, and throughout the entire song, illustrates how she is constantly on the speaker’s mind, for better or for worse. The comparison of Lacy’s “skin” to “puff pastry,” albeit somewhat surprising, portrays it as both delicate and shiny or glowing. Even her name, “Lacy,” is derived from a fabric that is delicate, beautiful, and intricate. The speaker sums up her praise by suggesting that Lacy is the “sweetest thing” on Earth (although through a rhetorical question). The phrase “this side of Hell” is an inversion of “this side of Heaven”; notably, the speaker implies through this change that she’s destined for Hell, not Heaven, at the end of her life. Internalized homophobia can involve and be sustained by a fear of going to Hell as well as the condemnation of queerness in the name of religion. In this manner, the beginning of the song already associates Lacy’s sweetness with negative consequences, which renders her a source of risk or temptation for the speaker.

The speaker continues with her complicated praise of the muse: “Dear angel Lacy, eyes white as daisies / Did I ever tell you that I’m not doin’ well?” Here she calls Lacy an “angel,” inciting the opposite image to “Hell” from the previous lyric. This juxtaposition marks a distinction between how the speaker views herself and Lacy. She likens Lacy’s “eyes” to “daisies,” but specifically points out the “white” of her eyes instead of her irises, in an unconventional flower comparison. Throughout the song, the speaker catalogues Lacy’s beauty and positive characteristics in slightly uncanny ways—this reflects her feelings for Lacy and how her understanding of them warps from positive to negative. Her question at the end of the verse here is an attempt to mask these feelings from Lacy and from herself. The phrase “not doin’ well” is certainly an understatement of the pain she goes on to describe.

Sapphic Stalking

In the chorus, the speaker’s infatuation with Lacy is expanded upon and revealed to be obsessive: “I care, I care, I care / Like perfume that you wear, I linger all the time / Watching, hidden in plain sight.” Here the rhyme scheme shifts to AABB, which emphasizes the repetition in the first line and the speaker’s desperation. She compares herself to Lacy’s “perfume,” something sweet, but explains that their similarity lies in their constant presence in Lacy’s life. The speaker is “hidden in plain sight” like a scent—you can tell that she’s there but you can’t see her. She “linger[s]” without actually approaching Lacy, while her sapphic romantic feelings remain “hidden in plain sight” under the guise of admiration or friendship. This theme is reminiscent of Rodrigo’s music video for “deja vu,” which depicts her stalking another girl and was inspired by Killing Eve, not to mention the GUTS bonus track, “obsessed”: “If I told you how much I think about her / You’d think I was in love.”

The second half of the chorus addresses the consequences of the speaker’s intense crush: “I try, I try, I try / But it takes over my life, I see you everywhere / The sweetest torture one could bear.” The speaker doesn’t exactly disclose what she is “try[ing]” to do, but the context suggests that she wants to get over Lacy or suppress her feelings. She sees Lacy “everywhere,” even when they’re not together, because she’s always on the speaker’s mind. Rodrigo uses language that insinuates an obsessive infatuation; however, infatuation is often characterized as inherently obsessive, which begs the question of how unusual this experience really is (not very). The speaker’s feelings for Lacy are “torture” because she doesn’t have her and can only admire her from afar, but it’s the “sweetest” kind because the pain is laced with hope that that might change.

I Don’t Like a Gold Rush

In the second verse, we learn that Lacy’s beauty and popularity extend beyond the speaker’s perspective: “Smart, sexy Lacy, I’m losin’ it lately / I feel your compliments like bullets on skin.” This first line sees a departure from Lacy’s physical appearance with an acknowledgement of her intelligence. Despite women typically being portrayed as one or the other, Lacy is both “[s]mart” and “sexy,” so she’s a modern ideal encompassing different qualities that people would find attractive. The second lyric leaves it unclear whether the “compliments” are being given to or received by Lacy, and each interpretation has its own implications. If Lacy is complimenting the speaker, they feel “like bullets” because she believes that they don’t contain the depth she wants them to; if the speaker’s feelings are not reciprocated, the attention she does get from Lacy is a painful reminder of that fact. On the other hand, if other people are always complimenting Lacy, the speaker’s pain is an expression of jealousy on account of this praise.

Not only is she popular, but Lacy is a true embodiment of beauty ideals: “Dazzling starlet, Bardot reincarnate / Well, aren’t you the greatest thing to ever exist?” Rodrigo’s reference to Brigitte Bardot grants Lacy icon status—as a “starlet” on the rise, she is simultaneously a recreation of an older aesthetic and an expression of something original. The speaker’s rhetorical question in this verse can be read as both sarcastic and genuine; by referring to Lacy as a “thing” she diminishes her value, but then does the opposite by adding the superlative “greatest.” The speaker considers Lacy a concept and ideal, not just a person, and her feelings have become equally overwhelming. These lyrics are also the song’s biggest departure from its rhyming patterns, as it’s the only verse stanza to not include a “Lacy” rhyme, and “exist” doesn’t rhyme exactly with “skin,” leaving the tone ambiguous. 

Illicit Temptation

Rodrigo adds new lyrics to the second chorus that encapsulate the speaker’s inner conflict: “Like ribbons in your hair, my stomach’s all in knots / You got the one thing that I want.” The speaker once again renders herself an accessory to Lacy (first perfume, now ribbons), signalling that she is there but her presence is somewhat inconsequential. Yet another positive image turns negative with the speaker’s stomach “in knots”; she is nervous around Lacy and can’t help the physical reaction of anxiety that ensues. The second lyric here encapsulates both feelings of jealousy and attraction. The speaker might be jealous of Lacy having “the one thing” that she wants, whether that be beauty, popularity, or something else. At the same time, Lacy could be “the one thing” that the speaker wants, making this a reference to the love and attention that she wants from Lacy.¹

The speaker tries in vain to manage her expectations and reason with herself: “I try, I try, I try / Try to rationalize, people are people / But it’s like you’re made of angel dust.” She’s trying to “rationalize” the way that she views Lacy and talk herself out of these big feelings. Despite knowing that Lacy is just a person like everyone else, she can’t help but compare her to an “angel” again. This time, however, it’s that she’s “made of angel dust,” which literally evokes the darker image of the remnants of an angel—Rodrigo uses the Heaven and Hell dichotomy again to render Lacy both perfect and imperfect. Notably, “angel dust” is also slang for an illicit drug, indicating once more that the speaker considers her attraction to Lacy an alluring but unhealthy addiction. This callback to religious imagery and the language of obsession align with the queer narrative of believing that natural attraction to someone is harmful and wrong if it doesn’t fit heteronormative standards.

I Hate You for Making Me Hate Myself

These references to internalized homophobia run throughout the final verse, tying together the feelings of love and hatred: “Lacy, oh Lacy, it’s like you’re out to get me / You poison every little thing that I do.” In a sudden turn, these lyrics render Lacy an active, antagonistic figure; until now, she’s been a stationary object of the speaker’s affection. By making Lacy the grammatical subject of these lines, Rodrigo highlights how the speaker’s fixation on Lacy has led to her own paranoia. This unsettling energy is replicated by the fact that “get me” does not rhyme with “Lacy,” departing from the song’s pattern. Like a lethal drug, the speaker compares Lacy to “poison,” blaming her for something she hasn’t done. Lacy only poisons the speaker’s life and thoughts by existing and becoming the constant object of her affection. Significantly, it is the speaker’s attraction to Lacy that makes her queerness undeniable, and her own insecurities about this turn her crush into a source of fear.

The speaker tries to deceive the listener and herself, but ultimately admits the truth: “Lacy, oh Lacy, I just loathe you lately / And I despise my jealous eyes and how hard they fell for you.” This first lyric is an absolute lie; the speaker might “loathe” Lacy since she’s upset by her feelings, but she definitely does not “just” hate her. She immediately contradicts this statement by admitting that she “fell for” Lacy, in love or infatuation. The speaker describes her eyes as “jealous,” but doesn’t explain whether she is jealous of Lacy or of whoever Lacy devotes her attention to instead of the speaker. She is mad at herself and wishes she didn’t feel this way—she doesn’t want to be in love with Lacy because she knows it only leads to jealousy.² The song ends with an extra lyric concluding this verse: “I despise my rotten mind and how much it worships you.” In both of these lines, the speaker separates herself from her “eyes” and “mind” to cope with and distance herself from her attraction to Lacy. Moreover, she believes she has a “rotten mind,” that her obsession with Lacy and her queerness at large mean that there is something wrong with her. This pattern of romantic feelings leading to self-hatred is typical of queer repression. With the word “worship,” the speaker deifies Lacy, acknowledging how she has put unrealistic expectations on her and the hope that she represents. Using religious terminology to describe love is a songwriting device that can hold even more weight in the context of queer love.

The final verse demonstrates that, even if the speaker finds Lacy unattainable, she has such love and care for her that it’s too much to handle. She responds to her internalized homophobia and fear of her feelings for Lacy by hating herself, since she can’t actually “just loathe” the very object of her affection. The speaker’s obsessive admiration of and resentment towards Lacy is the only vehicle for her feelings that she can process without having to come to terms with her sapphic attraction. Ultimately, the speaker is angry that Lacy makes her feel this way and represents her own insecurities, and she’s jealous of the person she is yet to become.

1. Remember, she also just referred to Lacy as the "greatest thing."

2. This concept reminds me of Taylor Swift's "gold rush": "Everybody wants you / But I don't like a gold rush."