Unit 6
Poetry
type, format, history, examples
The Elegy
• The elements of a traditional elegy mirror three
stages of loss.
– First, there is a lament, where the speaker
expresses grief and sorrow,
– then praise and admiration of the idealized dead,
– and finally consolation and solace.
• Many modern elegies have been written not
out of a sense of personal grief, but rather a
broad feeling of loss and metaphysical sadness.
– A famous example is the mournful series of ten
poems in Duino Elegies, by German poet Rainer
Maria Rilke.
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the Angelic
Orders? And even if one were to suddenly
take me to its heart, I would vanish into its
stronger existence. For beauty is nothing but
the beginning of terror, that we are still able to bear,
and we revere it so, because it calmly disdains
to destroy us. Every Angel is terror.
And so I hold myself back and swallow the cry
of a darkened sobbing. Ah, who then can
we make use of? Not Angels: not men,
and the resourceful creatures see clearly
that we are not really at home
in the interpreted world. Perhaps there remains
some tree on a slope, that we can see
again each day: there remains to us yesterday’s street,
and the thinned-out loyalty of a habit
that liked us, and so stayed, and never departed.
Oh, and the night, the night, when the wind full of space
wears out our faces – whom would she not stay for,
the longed-for, gentle, disappointing one, whom the solitary heart
with difficulty stands before. Is she less heavy for lovers?
Ah, they only hide their fate between themselves.
Do you not know yet? Throw the emptiness out of your arms
to add to the spaces we breathe; maybe the birds
will feel the expansion of air, in more intimate flight.
First Elegy
Rainer Maria Rilke.
This is what our dying looks like.
You believe in the sun. I believe I can’t love you.
Always be closing, Said our favorite professor before
He let the gun go off in his mouth. I turned 29 the
way any man turns In his sleep, unaware of the earth
Moving beneath him, its plates in Their places, a
dated disagreement. Let’s fight it out, baby. You have
Only so long left—a man turning In his sleep—so I
take a picture. I won’t look at it, of course. It’s His bad
side, his Mr. Hyde, the hole In a husband’s head, the O
Of his wife’s mouth. Every night, I take a pill. Miss
one, and I’m gone. Miss two, and we’re through.
Hotels Bore me, unless I get a mountain view, A room
in which my cell won’t work, And there’s nothing to
do but see The sun go down into the ground That
cradles us as any coffin can.
Another Elegy
by Jericho Brown
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cESxOdu
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Assignment : Write an Elegy.
Review examples of the form.
Include these stages in your poem.
– First, there is a lament, where the speaker expresses
grief and sorrow,
– then praise and admiration of the idealized dead,
– and finally consolation and solace.
You may write in any style with any # of lines
Review your poem and fix any errors.
Type
Edit
Place in your portfolio