Lyric Poetry's Universal Dimension

Extract

[...] Some are amnesic. The constellation of the Solitary is tense. / Poetry will steal my death from me.' In this quote, we can observe the poet's doubt about the reception of the poem: words make their way alone and take on a quantity of meaning that the poet does not control: 'The poet does not retain what he discovers; having transcribed it, he soon loses it. In this lies his novelty, his infinity and his peril.' If infinity and novelty are the qualities of the poem, it is the word 'peril' that comes to close this definition of the poem. [...]

[...] The poet offers his work to the other. He gives his unique experience to others in order to make it universal. For this, he passes from the lyrical to a that includes the reader in his experience. He carries a message of hope that is a message addressed to all and in which each one can see the mark of a possible that one must try to reach. Finally, he transcends the universal to speak of the divine and makes his experience a kind of prophecy that reaches all men. [...]

[...] The poet also handles language in a way that makes the symbolism of words play and creates a subtext to the text. Finally, he is wary of this language and measures the scope that the poem could take if the word exceeded thought by its multiplicity of meanings. The poet plays on the individuality of his experience in the world by offering it to the other: passing from the to the he allows his message to be given to the other. Thus, he makes a unique sentiment a universal sentiment, towards the quest for hope. [...]

[...] The poet is therefore the bearer of a hope: that of rallying the other to his cause, of making his fellow men brothers. Mahmoud Darwich, for example, writes a poem entitled am one of the kings of the end'. He thus places the in a 'some' which signifies his place in the world. He is 'one' among 'them'. He is the individual in the group. He unites a community around his self. He writes: 'Since I accepted peace I have no more present / To pass tomorrow near my vigil. Castile will brandish / Its crown on the minaret of God. [...]

[...] Love, or pleasure, then takes on a universal dimension. Reality is thus exposed to readers through the spatial framework: the poet shows his place of life, his surroundings, making his poetry palpable. Similarly, the temporal framework anchors the poem in an era. The poet, if he refers to a concrete event, allows the reader to make a link with other similar situations, by the fact that events multiply, follow and resemble each other, whether it is a war, a rebellion, an action, this one, although particular, inscribes itself in a multitude of other similar actions. [...]