Poetry is often associated with music. Ancient Greeks described the word “lyric”, as reciting poems to a harplike instrument called a lyre. Both poetry and music involve the principle of rhythm. Musicians listen for certain counts that make their music flow better and poets can develop a hearing for certain rhythms that can make their poems sounds better (Mays, 847). The poems being discussed are “spring”, by William Shakespeare and “Hip Hop”, by Mos Def. “Hip Hop” is a much longer ballad than “spring”, but both of the poems are meant to be written for music purposes.
Both poems use some form of personification, alliteration, and assonance. According to The Norton Introduction to literature, personification is “treating something nonhuman, …show more content…
Mos Def was born in Brooklyn, New York in December of 1973. The ballad “Hip Hop” has 64 lines total. In “Hip Hop”, Mos Def first writes about how hard it is to write rhymes and how hard it is to focus to do it. In line 8, he writes it can take days to complete his rhythms. In line 15- 19, Mos Def is describing where a young man (Mos Def) is from. Mos Def writes how he’s seeing into tomorrow. In lines 30 and 31, Mos Def is writing about how African-Americans got to hip hop and where they started. He writes, “We went from picking cotton, to chain-gang line chopping, to be-bopping, to hip-hopping. In lines 35-40, “I’m getting big props for this thing called hip hop, Where you can get paid or get shot, when your product in stock, the fair weather friends flock, when your chart position drop.” Mos Def is describing how hip-hop can be a reward or a death sentence and how your friends can leave you if your position isn’t the best in hip hop. Mos Def ends “Hip Hop” with the lines, “Its all-city like Phase 2, hip hop will simply amaze you, Praise you, pay you, Do whatever you say do, but Black, and it can’t save you.” Mos Def is finishing this poem by summarizing all the things hip hop can do, how it will amaze you, bring you up, and take care of
Both poems use some form of personification, alliteration, and assonance. According to The Norton Introduction to literature, personification is “treating something nonhuman, …show more content…
Mos Def was born in Brooklyn, New York in December of 1973. The ballad “Hip Hop” has 64 lines total. In “Hip Hop”, Mos Def first writes about how hard it is to write rhymes and how hard it is to focus to do it. In line 8, he writes it can take days to complete his rhythms. In line 15- 19, Mos Def is describing where a young man (Mos Def) is from. Mos Def writes how he’s seeing into tomorrow. In lines 30 and 31, Mos Def is writing about how African-Americans got to hip hop and where they started. He writes, “We went from picking cotton, to chain-gang line chopping, to be-bopping, to hip-hopping. In lines 35-40, “I’m getting big props for this thing called hip hop, Where you can get paid or get shot, when your product in stock, the fair weather friends flock, when your chart position drop.” Mos Def is describing how hip-hop can be a reward or a death sentence and how your friends can leave you if your position isn’t the best in hip hop. Mos Def ends “Hip Hop” with the lines, “Its all-city like Phase 2, hip hop will simply amaze you, Praise you, pay you, Do whatever you say do, but Black, and it can’t save you.” Mos Def is finishing this poem by summarizing all the things hip hop can do, how it will amaze you, bring you up, and take care of