When people consider song lyrics and poetry, they often connect with the idea of Rap music. “As poetry rap can often be characterized by word-play relying on colloquialism, innuendo, false rhyme, alliteration and basically ‘everything including the kitchen sink’ of a verbal nature,” said musician Frank Elliott in response to a Quora.com question. But song lyrics of a variety of kinds are generally poetic.

The song Beauty and The Beast, for example, which was released by Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson on October 29, 1991, has many poetic elements.

Dion, a Canadian singer who is also known for singing My Heart Will Go On from the romance film Titanic, teamed up with Bryson, who sang A Whole New World from Aladdin, to help make the Beauty and the Beast song popular. The song was written by lyricist Howard Ashman and composed by Alan Menken. Anna Juarez says, “I love it. It’s a great song. I love the movie.”

Beauty and the Beast is poetic because it has both rhyme and emotion, two characteristics of poetry. The song is about Belle and the Beast changing how they change emotionally and, at the end of the movie, physically. The pop song describes the growth of their friendship and communicates the change in the duet as well as in the movie version by Angela Lansbury, who played Mrs. Potts in the 1991 movie.

Some poetic devices in Beauty and the Beast are rhyme scheme, simile and anaphora.

The rhyme scheme is fairly obvious in the third and fourth lines of the verses, where friends / bends, scared / prepared and strange / change clearly rhyme. There are others throughout the song that are not as strong or consistent, but because of the musical score, they work well.

The simile is in the familiar alternate title Tale as Old as Time, comparing two very different things – stories and time.

Anaphora is the repeated use of a word or phrase at the beginning of a line. One section that anaphora is completely clear is when the lyrics say:

Ever just the same
Ever a surprise
Ever as before and ever just as sure as the sun will rise

Ever just the same
Ever a surprise
Ever as before
Ever just as sure
As the sun will rise

“I think it just fits the movie well and it was a nice ring to it,” said Lillian Baxter.