What is a Lyric?
Poetry that expresses the personal feelings or thoughts of the speaker in a melodious or song-like way.
Singing Your Emotions: The Melodious World of Lyric
Lyric poetry is a form of self-expression that combines language, sound, and feeling to create a harmonious and personal work of art. Often called the 'music of poetry,' lyric is characterized by its use of musical devices such as repetition, rhyme, and meter.
The subjective nature of lyric means that it often deals with personal experiences, emotions, and thoughts of the speaker. From love to heartbreak, grief to joy, lyric poetry immerses the reader in the speaker's world, allowing the reader to relate to the speaker's experiences and emotions.
The term 'lyric' comes from the ancient Greeks, who originally used the term to describe a poem sung to the accompaniment of a lyre (a type of stringed instrument). Over time, lyric evolved to include any poetry that expressed the personal emotions or thoughts of the speaker in a song-like way.
Lyric poetry is a powerful tool for writers, and is often used to express personal experiences, emotions, and thoughts. Here are a few examples of how it has been put to use in literature.
This classic poem by John Keats is a beautiful example of lyric poetry that uses vivid imagery and musical language to create a dreamlike mood. With lines like 'Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget/What thou among the leaves hast never known,' the speaker expresses a longing to escape the mundanity of life.
T. S. Eliot's epic poem The Waste Land is a groundbreaking work of modernist literature that is filled with examples of lyric poetry. The poem is made up of a series of fragmented, disjointed scenes and characters that reflect the chaotic nature of the modern world. Through these scenes, Eliot explores themes of despair, disillusionment, and the quest for spiritual enlightenment.