The thought process behind this essay is to demonstrate to you the lyric genre.
A wide range of poetry shares similar characteristics. Today we are going to discuss lyric poetry. Imagine that you are working and listening to the radio and your favorite song shows up, you will immediately start to sing with it. Do you realize that when this occurs, you really sing poetry? All songs can be viewed as poetry. In fact, they fall under the class of lyrical poetry. Lyrical poetry demonstrates personal emotions or thoughts of the speaker. There are three different types of poetry: ode, elegy, and sonnet. There are many types of lyric poems and songs, each with its own format and purpose. Let’s look at some.
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The first one is a song called “Earth Song” by Michael Jackson. It is a good example of lyric poetry because the song shows us the feelings of a speaker. This song has mixed feelings, like painful regret or guilt. The big part of lyric poetry is to show the emotions the author made in his piece. Here is a little part of his song,
“Did you ever stop to notice
All the children dead from war?
Did you ever stop to notice
This crying Earth, this weeping shore?”
Even lyrics printed on a page can retain musical qualities like rhythm. This example is an ode type of lyric poetry, which is serious and very emotional, although the speaker directly addresses to people the message/main idea of us “people” to stop killing our planet Earth.
Another example of the ode type of lyric poetry is a song called “Innocence Lost” by Amy Grant,
“I can't relive my life
I can't retrace my tracks
I can't undo what's done
There is no going back”
this song is emotional and has a sad tone. Although the speaker directly addresses the message/main idea of how innocence is important and priceless to people.
Sonnet is a type of lyric poetry which has a specific form. Sonnet has to have only fourteen lines and have a specific rhyme scheme. A poem called “How do I love thee?” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning is a good example of sonnet lyrical poetry.
“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height”
She writes that the love she has for her future husband is consuming every part of her.
Many lyric poems are about love, although they can be about anything which stirs the emotions.
As a formal genre, lyric poetry is usually a single-voiced genre in which one voice speaks directly to an audience. Elegy is a very solemn and formal, they are usually done upon on the death of someone or something. And it is important to recognize that we normally hear about elegy in response to the death of the person, but we could have an elegy related to the death/loss of the idea, like the death/loss of innocence or childhood. For example a poem “Because I could not stop for Death”, by Emily Dickinson.
“Because I could not stop for Death –
He kindly stopped for me –
The Carriage held but just Ourselves –
And Immortality.”
This poem represents a close impact between Death and Immortality. Emily uses personification to show Death and Immortality as characters. the main idea of this poem is an explanation of death for what it is really is, evil and cruel. Another example of elegy is poem called “O Captain! My Captain! ” by Walt Whitman.
“O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won,”
this poem is written in the form of elegy and is aimed to honor President Lincoln.
Again, lyrical poetry expresses the personal thoughts and feelings of a single speaker. lyrical poems usually short. lyrical poetry has three different types of it. The first one is ode which is very serious and very emotional, the ode designed to pay respect to the person or a thing, also the speaker directly addresses the subject. The second one is a sonnet. Sonnet has fourteen lines and has some form of a specific rhyme scheme. And the last one is an elegy. Elegy is very formal and usually addresses the death of someone or something.
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