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July 23, 2025 10 mins
Colin Lowther and Alice Irizarry talk about a way that people have expressed their feelings of love to one another since ancient times… poetry that is sung or spoken.

https://spotlightenglish.com/uncategorized/expressing-your-love/

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Spotlight Advanced. I'm Colin Lowther and.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm Alice Irasari. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting.
It is easier for people to understand no matter where
in the world they live.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
It is nineteen sixty nine and a young Stephen Stills
has a broken heart. The woman that he loves is
leaving him for someone else. He feels hopeless trying to
understand how the person he wants so much could be

(00:48):
gone from his life. He is just a poor musician.
He has little to offer her, nothing to bring her back,
so he does the only thing he knows how to do.
Stephen Still's writes a song.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
The song Sweet Judy Blue Eyes, did not bring back
the woman that he loved. Stills was not the first
person to write a love song. Love songs like his
have been sung for thousands of years, expressing everything from
the sadness of a lost love to the joy of
new desire. These songs show that this longing for another

(01:30):
is not new. Today's Spotlight is on the world history
of love songs and poetry.

Speaker 1 (01:40):
People have created love songs since before the invention of
writing songs. Words and stories were very important to ancient cultures.
These cultures expressed themselves freely and openly. Some experts argue
that these songs did not qualify as love songs. C. F.

(02:05):
Lewis was an English writer. He once wrote that love
poetry was less than a thousand years old. He suspected
that love as we know it was invented by French
poets in the eleventh century BCEE.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
But love was still an emotion that ancient humans felt.
They may not have expressed their words in the same
way that we do today, the feelings that brought them
to sing would have been the same. Tim Hancock is
a literature expert. In his story called The Chemistry of
Love Poetry, he argues that this is because love is

(02:46):
a physical experience ingrained in human nature.

Speaker 3 (02:51):
Poets recognize that love is a physical as well as
a mental experience. This agrees with our growing on understanding
of love as a universal drive. Hunger hurts the stomach,
the need for warmth causes us to shiver. Love shakes

(03:12):
the heart.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
The oldest love poetry in the world seems to agree
with Hancock's ideas. This poem, the Love Song of Shoe Sween,
was written in two thousand Bce in Sumeria. This ancient
kingdom existed three thousand years ago in present day Iraq.

(03:36):
But the things the love song's writer speaks about are
just like those a woman might feel today. She compares
the one she desires to a lion, a large, strong cat.
She sings, you.

Speaker 4 (03:53):
Have captivated me of my own free will. I will
come to you, man. Let let me flee with you
into the bedroom.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
The love song of Shoe Swen's author is very explicit
about her physical desire for the one she loves. The
words she uses are very simple. She does not have
the art of a modern poet, but her openness shows
that love of this kind existed long before the eleventh century.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
The emotions behind all love poetry and songs may be
the same, but the way that people write depends highly
on the place and time. Ancient Chinese love poetry has
a different quality than the ancient Sumerian variety. Shu Swen's

(04:48):
speaker tells her lover exactly what she wants from him,
but Chinese poetry is not so direct. Dou Fu was
one of the greatest Chinese poets. His poem at the
World's End is an amazing example.

Speaker 5 (05:08):
Cold is the wind that rises over this remote place,
old friend, tell me, when will a wild bird goose
reach me here? From the rivers and lakes where the
autumn waters are overflowing.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
At first glance, Dofu's poem does not seem to be
about love at all, but do Fu was writing about
love indirectly. In Chinese love poetry, some animals or events
are symbolic. They have two or more meanings that the
reader must understand. A wild goose is a kind of

(05:45):
large bird. These birds mate for life, just like many
humans do. So geese are symbolic of marriage, of long
life together. When Dofu asks if a wild goose will
reach him, he is asking about companionship. He is in
a place that is cold and lonely. He wishes for

(06:06):
love to fly to him like a bird.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
Many love poems are meant to be read, but most
throughout history was spoken or sung. William Shakespeare was one
of the greatest poets in the history of the English language.
His poems were written to be spoken.

Speaker 2 (06:32):
One of Shakespeare's most famous poems is Sonnet eighteen. In
this poem, Shakespeare compares his love to a day in summer.
He decides that while he likes summer. He likes the
person he loves better. She is just as beautiful and
just as pleasant. But unlike a summer day, she does

(06:53):
not change to him. She will never fade.

Speaker 1 (06:58):
Shakespeare's son it has a different quality to it than
do Fu or Shoe sweens. Shakespeare's poem is very technical.
It does not express the same desire as the ancient
Sumerian poet. It does not have the same longing expressed

(07:18):
in At the World's End. But Shakespeare's goal is the same.
There is a person that he loves so much that
he feels the need to speak to her. But this
feeling is so big that he cannot speak to her
in normal language. He must make her a thing of

(07:42):
beauty that shows her own.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
Today. Love poetry is as different as the people on earth.
Some people write using traditional forms. Some people write clearly
what they feel and what they think. Others feel that
words are not enough, They make music that expresses their desire.

Speaker 1 (08:07):
Experts do not always agree what purpose love poetry serves.
Why have people developed this form of expression? What advantages
does poetry give? These are all fair questions, But for
those of us in the thick of love, this does
not seem to matter. Love poetry exists because there are

(08:33):
some feelings that are too big to leave hidden. But
these feelings are also so overwhelming that one word does
not do them justice. It has been that way longer
than we can understand. Love is one experience that unites

(08:55):
us from now to the beginning of time.

Speaker 2 (09:03):
Have you ever been in love? Did you feel the
need to write about it? How did you express yourself?
You can leave a comment on our website at www
dot Spotlight English dot com. You can also find us
on YouTube, Facebook, TikTok, Blue Sky, and x. You can

(09:25):
also get our programs delivered directly to your Android or
Apple device through our free official Spotlight English app.

Speaker 1 (09:33):
The writer of this program was Dan Christman. The producer
was Michyo Ozaki. The voices you heard were from the
United Kingdom and the United States. All quotes were adapted
for this program and voiced by Spotlight. This program is

(09:54):
called Expressing Your Love.

Speaker 2 (09:57):
We hope you can join us again for the next
Spotlight program. Goodbye, h
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