Most of those traditional definitions do have something in common (a)1)
short 2) musicality 3) personal expression -- the analytic lyric or illyric
as David terms it, is (b) 1) short 2) often lacks musicality 3) tends to be
impersonal. One point is that sometimes the lyricism is incidental, I mean
that it not part of the formal arrangement of the poem --like a form of
"outburst" or lyrical spurt --sometimes those moments seem sufficient to
characterizes this or that poem as being lyrical. David Bircumshaw mentioned
the problem with signifiers --certainly if someone says a poem is lyrical
that is very different from making a claim that it is a lyric i.e. has the
formal qualities of what is considered traditionally to be a lyric. A writer
of lyrics and a writer of lyrical poetry are different --it would be akin to
saying that he writes haiku or he writes haiku-like poetry. All of this
means that we have three co-existing forms of poetry:
a) traditional lyric poetry -
b) analytic lyric poetry/modern lyric post-tonal/or non musical/ often
short/ less emphasis on author
c) lyrical poetry and incidental lyricism, a moment of brevity -an
outburst, passionate, change in meter or rhythm and focus on authorial
expression, often musical
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