They date back to ancient times and remain a strong current in modern poetry. Here are some of the best
Elegy, an individual response to the death of a person or a group, began in Greece and Rome as a particular metrical form. But elegies are among the greatest poems in every language, whatever their form. Traditionally, they mirror three elements of mourning: grief; memories of the dead; and some kind of consolation – because people in grief often find relief in poems expressing a loss they thought was unique to them.
But elegy took me completely by surprise, just as death itself can do. When I began work on my new collection Emerald, I was simply interested in the gems themselves, their mining, myths, geology, history. I talked to emerald cutters, pondered the paradoxical symbolism of green, colour of envy and poison as well as magic. Then, very suddenly, my 97-year old mum was rushed to hospital. During that dark time, the emeralds surprised me by triggering a flood of poems about her: her jokes and determination, the pleasure she took in talking to old friends, the generous mutual support of everyone in the family as she died; my childhood memories of her; snapshots of her childhood.
Related: Douglas Kennedy's top 10 books about grief
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