Lyric Poetry

Modern lyric writing is an informal form of poetry that expresses personal emotions or sentiments, usually spoken aloud in the first person. Lyric poetry has its beginnings in the Romantic era when artists used music as a medium to express their emotions and feelings. These songs were called “suite morae” and were written around a central theme. They often took on the form of ballads, epics, or odes. In time the romantic theme changed to more universal themes such as love, sadness, longing, pain, triumph, etc.

Lyric poetry is used today as a genre of poetry focusing on feelings and emotions instead of story telling. Many times a poet will write a poem about how they are feeling but chose not to tell a story to match the emotion the poem is portraying. This allows the poet to tap into our emotions by simply using our voice to tell the tale. Lyric poetry also has the ability to tell a story through its use of words rather than the medium of storytelling.

Lyric poetry does not have the same structure of a narrative poem as a dramatic monologue poem. A narrative poem usually has a beginning, a middle, and an end. A lyric poem has no beginning or end and usually begins with a stanza and ends with another stanza. Each poem in a lyric poem often has a distinct and recognizable title which helps the reader to know what poem is coming next.