The Poetic World of Love Poetry in Dargin Folklore

The article analyzes love songs in Dargin folklore, considers their ideological, aesthetic and compositional features as well as the  system of expressive means and methods, such as epi-thet, metaphor, comparison, conversion, symbols, artistic  parallelism, etc. The genres as follows are characteristic of Dargin  love poetry: quatrain songs (khabqub), dialoguesongs, addressing  songs (or monologue-songs); the prevailing motifs expressed by  their contents are those of the narrator’s emotional state, i.e. his/her actual feelings and emotional upheaval. Structurally each of the  genres has its peculiarities: quatrain songs are short poetic miniatures, mostly lyrical by nature; dialogue-songs take the form of dialogues which are a chain of questions and answers where a young man and a young woman take turns in the lead; addressing songs  are compiled of addresses or monologues which are is essence reflections and musings. Addressing songs create a special emotional mood that expresses some certain psychological state. Those often  contain addresses to natural phenomena, celestial bodies, poetic  images, sym-bols, etc. The number of themes of Dargin love songs  is vast and varied. Those are songs about ha-tred, one-sided  feelings, life and death, social disparity, confusion of the world, etc.  In terms of emotions, feelings and moods expressed, love songs are  most diverse and vary from merry and soulful ones to those full of sadness, depicting the narrator’s spirits. The system of expressive  means of love poetry includes epithets, poetic metaphors, comparisons, symbols of the natural world, artistic parallelisms,  contrasts and oppositions, appeals, monologues. Epithet is one of  the main means of creating an artistic image in many folk genres.  The main purpose of epithet in the Dargin love song is to help reveal  the narrator’s state of spirit and mind. Epithets increase  expressiveness, contribute to poetic richness. The epithets applied in love songs may take both simple and complex, i.e. extended, forms. 
In love poetry of the Dargin people, considerable attention is paid to natural phenomena. Pictures of nature help express the narrator’s  inner world, add to the brightness and expressive-ness of images and deepen their psychologism. In this context, a special role is played by com-parisons. The narrator’s mental state is compared  with natural phenomena which increases the emotionalism and  dramatics of the situation. The rich poetic world of love poetry is an integral part of the spiritual heritage of the Dargin people.

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