Poetry In Music?
Please Quote One Of Your Favorite Song Lines Or Lyrics And Explain How It Exhibits At Least One Poetry Term? Make sure that your quoted lyrics are appropriate. Please italicize the song lyrics, include the song title/artist(s), and qualify or establish the connection between the poetry term and the lyrics. (Due Wednesday 2-06-2013 By 2:30p.m.)
posted by Greg T at Monday, February 04, 2013
27 Comments:
“'Round here they sing broken hymn Their prayers flow better when they're soaked in gin The amp's dusty and sits in the corner By a bartender that’ll pickpocket your heart And a jukebox that’ll steal your quarter.” Neon Cathedral by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis
The literary term in the song lyrics is where the jukebox is personified to be steeling people’s quarters. The song is giving the jukebox human like qualities to steal when it really can’t do that. It may be a waste of money but the jukebox itself does not intentionally steal the quarter. The way that the term is incorporated into the song is smart because some people may think that certain inanimate objects tend to steal money from them but they don’t intentionally do it. It is a human like quality that only living things intentionally do.
“Clinging to me, Like a last breath you would breathe, You were like home to me, I don't recognize the street
Please don't close your eyes, Don't know where to look without them, Outside the cars speed by, I never heard them until now.” These lines from the song I Know You Care, by Ellie Goulding, use a lot of sensory language. When she says cling to me, it gives a feeling of holding on to something or someone. Or when she says the cars speed by, it makes you feel like you can hear the cars yourself. The words make you think of pictures and feelings from your own reality.
"Dedicate yourself and you can find yourself sitting in the hall of fame, and the worlds gonna know your name cause you burn with the brightest flamend the worlds gonna know your name and you'll be on the walls of fame".
In the song "Hall Of Fame" by The Script, many connections between this song and poetry. For example, in the line " cause you burn with the brigtest flame" uses great imagery to explain and give listeners confidence. Also this song does a good job of comparing a person to something great, and uses a hall of fame symbolicly.
"It took a while for you to find me, but I was hiding in the lime tree, above the city and the rain clouds, I poked a whole and watched it drain out." Lime tree by Trevor Hall makes me imagine him literally being in a lime tree singing his songs. Which is why this song connects with the literary term "imagery" because I am able to imagine it and see it in my mind. The other literary term in this part of the song would be a metaphor, because he isn't literally in a lime tree. It stands for something else which is what a metaphor is all about.
“And if you'd 'a took to me like a gull takes to the wind. Well, I'd 'a jumped from my tree, and I'd a danced like the kind of the eyesores, and the rest of our lives would 'a fared well” (New Slang by The Shins)
In this song they are singing about how if a girl would be like a gull and take to the wind then he would follow. This lyric has a simile to compare a girl to a gull. This proves that there are poetry terms in today’s music.
“Moses Mother Placed her baby in a basket on the water when she hid him in the rushes he was found by Pharaoh’s daughter. Oh, she took a leap of faith, kept her tiny prophet safe.” These words are from “Leap of Faith” by Lynne Perry Christofferson. These lines have rhythm and rhyme. The words faith and safe rhyme and water and daughter rhyme in the phrase. The rhythm is one, two, three, four beats. The words “in a basket” when clapped with the correct placement of claps in the phrase gives the amount of four beats. As the words go along the four-beat rhythm is repeated throughout the song, yet it flows smoothly from the fourth beat to beat one.
"You shout it out, But I can't hear a word you say, I'm talking loud not saying much. I'm criticized but all your bullets ricochet, You shoot me down, but I get up." The song "Titanium" by David Guetta is about finding inner strength in yourself to stand up to people. The slow pace that this song is sung at creates a rhythm that helps to let every line sink in. "You shout it out," *breath* "But I can't hear a word you say." *breath* The pace of this song allows the song not to have rhyming words making this a free verse song, but allowing it have rhyming beats. This song also sets a tone that starts out insecurely and then builds to fearlessness. "I'm criticized but all your bullets ricochet." There are also metaphors in this song by comparing being "criticized" to "bullets" and being "shot down" to being emotionally taken down. From this song alone, we can see that music does contain poetic terms.
"Settle down, it'll all be clear. Don't pay no mind to the demons, they fill you with fear. The trouble it might drag you down. If you get lost, you can always be found." This quote from the song "Home" by Phillip Phillips displays personification because it is giving the human characteristic of "dragging" something down to trouple, which really isn't something that is able to drag. It also has a paradox in it when it says "If you get lost, you can always be found." because the two things contradict one another. Lastly it has rhyme in it, when the lyrics say "clear" and "fear'. Those are just a few of the many poetic terms I'm sure you could take from this song, and more specifically from this quote of the lyrics.
"When you try your best but you don't succeed/When you get what you want but not what you need/When you feel so tired but you can't sleep/Stuck in reverse" These are the lyrics to Fix You by Coldplay. It uses rhymes to show the emotion people feel when they are in different situations. The last line even compares us to a car perhaps, stuck in reverse going backward in our decisions and actions. This would be metaphor and rhyme, you can even argue eye rhyme when put in the right layout.
“But if the world could remain within a frame like a painting on the wall, then I think we would see the beauty. Then we would stand staring in awe at our still lives posed like a bowl of oranges, like a story told by the fault lines and the soil.” - Bowl of Oranges by Bright Eyes
This line exhibits a simile, comparing the beauty in our lives to a painting. The lyrics explain that while we may not notice, our lives are interesting and worth paying attention to, much like how we analyze and enjoy art. This line is a simile because it uses the word “like” in comparing the people and the paintings.
"Battered and torn. Still i can see the light. Tattered and worn. But i must kneel to fight. Friend of mine, what can't you spare I know some times. It gets cold in there When my legs no longer carry and the warm wind chills my bones. I reach for mother mary And i shall not walk alone" I Shall Not Walk Alone by Blind Boys of Alabama
This passage uses a lot of metaphors and uses expressions such as "kneel to fight" to show that your faith is what is worth fighting for. Another metaphor is "seeing the light" which could be a reference to better times and hopes and a brighter future after all the hardship and dark times.
"A hundred dollars for a pair of shoes I would never hoop in. Look at me, look at me, I’m a cool kid. I’m an individual, yea, but I’m part of a movement. My movement told me be a consumer and I consumed it" Wings by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis is about how easily we can be swept up by consumerism and trying to look the part of society that we lose sight of ourselves. The line "I'm an individual, yea, but I'm part of a movement. My movement told me be a consumer and I consumed it." says that we can claim to be individual, but if we only follow the brands and their image, we stop becoming individual and we become a part of a brand.
Hey now, this is my desire, Consume me like a fire, cause I just want something beautiful, To touch me, I know that I'm in reach, Cause I am down on my knees. I'm waiting for something beautiful. Oh, something beautiful. (Something Beautiful by Needtobreathe) This quote demonstrates a simile in the line “consume me like a fire”. This song also includes the metaphor of “something beautiful”. The artist uses this phrase to describe something that is needed but missing and unknown in our lives. It is something that will complete our lives and is desperately needed. Also, there are a few times in which this phrase rhymes. For example: “desire” and “fire”. Though it is not a complete rhyme, “reach” and “knees” also sound similar in the song.
“Losing him was blue like I’d never known, missing him was dark grey all alone, forgetting him was like trying to know somebody you've never met, but loving him was red, oh red burning red.” –Taylor Swift, Red
These lines use metaphors to compare love to colors. These are metaphors because they do not use “like” or “as” to compare. The song using symbolism of colors to explain the emotions. This helps relate the song to a larger audience because most people relate red to love, blue to sadness, and so on.
"Suddenly I turned around and she was standing there
With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair. She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns, "Come in" she said, "I'll give you shelter from the storm".
- Bob Dylan, Shelter From The Storm
This phrase from 'Shelter' is in my opinion, one of the strongest lyrical moments Bob Dylan ever had. His beautiful imagery of his female savior, she walked up so gracefully, and took his "crown of thorns." Of course, the "crown of thorns" is a biblical reference and metaphor for hardship, duty and pain. Dylan is saying that this woman took all of that away, and gave him shelter from the world, from the bad, from everything ill. Shelter, from 'the storm.'
"You only know what I want you to."
"I know everything you don't want me to."
"Your mouth is poison. Your mouth is wine."
"You think your dreams are the same as mine."
"I don't love you, but I always will." The song Poison and Wine by the civil Wars, is about a man and a woman who think they understand eachother, but get upset when the other claims they know them. In reality, they don't understand eachother, but they do love eachother. They can't help their feelings. This song relates to rhyming, because the last word of every other line rhymes.
"and the wolves never stopped
the tracks kept going and I took off
so I don't know how your story ends
but I know I'll never go into those woods again"
The song "Became" by Atmosphere is an allusion to a man who's friend became so engulfed in the world of substance abuse that it eventually lead to an overdose, but he wasn't aware of his friend's habits. The lyrics of the song refer to being on a camping trip with his dad who gets lost. he follows his father's footsteps only to find out that the wolves have gotten him. The way that Slug of Atmosphere used the whole song as a metaphor made the feelings of experiencing the death of a friend due to drugs more imaginable and real.
I see trees of green........ red roses too
I see em bloom..... for me and for you
And I think to myself.... what a wonderful world.
I see skies of blue..... clouds of white
Bright blessed days....dark sacred nights
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world.
~What a wonderful World by Luis Armstrong
The literary term in this song is imagery. Also the entire song has mainly an: A,A,B,B. The song is more famous than most could hope to be, It is about "our wonderful world" written in a time of depression; it lifted the spirits of americans. This quote is describing the wonderful things in the world that we live in, and unveils the true beauty in them.
"I met this girl, when I was ten years old
And what I loved most she had so much soul
She was old school, when I was just a shorty
Never knew throughout my life she would be there for me."
This is from I Used To Love H.E.R by Common. This uses metaphors that are very cleverly hidden. This entire songs comes off as a track about a girl that Common loves but in reality it is a metaphor to Hip Hop and how it has changed over the years. For better or for worse.
"When you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking. Racing around to come up behind you again." ~Time by Pink Floyd
This line represents personification because it illustrates that the sun is something real instead of an inanimate object. This quote is demonstrating how we always run to catch up with something that we can not catch up with.
“Older father, weary soul, you'll drive, Back to the home you made on the mountainside, With that ugly, terrible thing, Those papers for divorce, And a lonely ring, A lonely ring, Sit on your porch, And pluck your strings,” ‘Blood’ by the Middle East is about how hopeless one feels when you can't control something and how sad this can be. I also really like this because it paints interesting imagery in my head. It's a song about being human and how all the people you love will perish by events we simply can't control, and we must be able to cope with that and come to the realization that this is how it will be. the lyrics that really stick out to me are when he says:
“And there's nothing you can do about it now"
This is where the realization comes in and what makes him so sad but at the same time he realizes that this is what life is and we have to take it as it is.
"I hate to turn up out of the blue, uninvited But I couldn't stay away, I couldn't fight it I had hoped you'd see my face and that you'd be reminded That for me, it isn't over" Someone Like You by Adele
This line expresses rhyme. Uninvited, fight it, and reminded all rhyme. I think rhyming is used for foreshadowing in this song. It kind of build up to her actual opinion. She has a hidden message that everyone hides their feelings and may not believe them, but they should just accept it.
"You gotta fail a thousand times before you see it through. You gotta spend your last dime before you ever make a million. You gotta know what brought you here and you gotta lose to persevere. but it's the way the sun will rise through the darkest night. Yeah its always been worth the fight." By the Eli Young Band. This song is about how we all go through struggles and losses but everything is worth the fight. You have to go through struggles in life but in order to achieve something you have to give up something like in "Matinee". This song uses imagery throughout the song which is a poetic term.
"We were the ones you used to make fun of
We stayed at home alone instead of falling in love
We never got the chance to be prom king
We didn’t even dance but here's the thing
We got the cars
We got the money
We need some sun but I'm telling you honey
That the geeks will the geeks will
The geeks will inherit the Earth" From The Geeks Will Inherit the Earth by I Fight Dragons
This has a lot of repetition in the We which starts almost all of the lines in the chorus. Also in these lines it has imagery in the form of showing what kind of people that they use to be and what they are now.
Blog Response
“Who knows what tomorrow will bring, maybe sunshine or maybe rain, but as for me I’ll wait and see, and maybe it’ll bring my love to me, no.” These lyrics by RJD2’s song Smoke and Mirrors displays a few poetic terms. For one there is rhythm in this and a couple of the lines rhyme with each other. It also uses a metaphoric type of pattern when it says “who knows what tomorrow will bring, maybe sunshine or maybe rain,” basically saying that tomorrow could be good or it could be bad, but who knows.
"Oh, little darlin', stir it up. Come on, babe! Come on and stir it up, wo-o-a! Little darlin', stir it up! Stick with me, baby! Come on, come on and stir it up, oh-oh! Little darlin', stir it up." This song is by the Legend Bob Marley. In this song he is basically just wanting to mix it up a little. One Poetry term in this song is when Bob Marley Repeats himself. Also an onomatopoeia when he sings wo-o-a! The way this is incorporated into the song might not seem the way its supposed to be used but it works this way.
"Oh, little darlin', stir it up. Come on, babe! Come on and stir it up, wo-o-a! Little darlin', stir it up! Stick with me, baby! Come on, come on and stir it up, oh-oh! Little darlin', stir it up." This song is by the Legend Bob Marley. In this song he is basically just wanting to mix it up a little. One Poetry term in this song is when Bob Marley Repeats himself. Also an onomatopoeia when he sings wo-o-a! The way this is incorporated into the song might not seem the way its supposed to be used but it works this way.
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