The Word on the Street: Rock Lyrics

A vibrant new collection of poems—that also double as rock songs—from the Pulitzer Prize–winning poet

In his new book of rock lyrics, Paul Muldoon goes back to the essential meaning of the term "lyric"—a short poem sung to the accompaniment of a musical instrument. These words are written for music most assuredly, with half an ear to Yeats's ballad-singing porter drinkers and half to Cole Porter—and indeed, many of them double as rock songs, performed by Wayside Shrines, the Princeton-based...