All That Glitters: Florence Welch's Useless Magic Is, to the Surprise of No One, Incredibly Useful

The Florence and the Machine songwriter's book is creativity captured. Raw and personal, her poems frequently comment on the creative process itself in revealing ways.

Welcome back to All That Glitters: (Re)appraisals of musicians, actors, and other culture-makers who have written and/or published poetry. All That Glitters is a semi-regular feature of PopPoetry, a poetry and pop culture Substack written by Caitlin Cowan. Subscribe to get PopPoetry in your inbox weekly.

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What’s the difference between a poem and a song lyric?

One is written and one is sung, you might say. Not so fast—poetry originally developed as a spoken or sung art form, and many poets performing today make use of their voice in all its registers. And lyrics themselves can survive on the page.

Ok: what’s the difference between a poem on the page and a song lyric on the page?

A song lyric, if it’s following even the faintest suggestion of a traditional structure, will have