| 1. | a mournful, melancholy, or plaintive poem, esp. a funeral song or a lament for the dead. |
| 2. | a poem written in elegiac meter. |
| 3. | a sad or mournful musical composition. |

A form of poetry that mourns the loss of someone who has died or something that has deteriorated. A notable example is the “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard,” by Thomas Gray. (Compare eulogy.)