How to Use poignancy in a Sentence

poignancy

noun
  • The day will be filled with poignancy and pageantry, tears and smiles.
    — Frida Ghitis, CNN, 17 Sep. 2022
  • The bloody day painted the band's set with pain and poignancy.
    — Craig Hlavaty, Houston Chronicle, 19 May 2018
  • And why not; there’s poignancy and irony built into the idea.
    — Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 24 Mar. 2022
  • The poignancy of their shock still resonates.
    — Adam Gopnik, New Yorker, 12 Jan. 2026
  • There’s a certain poignancy in that.
    — Peter Wehner, The Atlantic, 6 Mar. 2026
  • There’s a poignancy in seeing the two of your names on the screen in the same film.
    — Rebecca Keegan, HWD, 15 May 2018
  • There’s nothing else like it on earth, and in that there’s poignancy, even hope.
    — Longreads, 29 Dec. 2022
  • Its poignancy is in the fact that there will always be a limit.
    — K. Austin Collins, Rolling Stone, 14 Dec. 2022
  • So is there some sort of poignancy in making this latest film?
    — Antonia Blyth, Deadline, 17 Dec. 2025
  • The timing of the words added poignancy to the messages.
    — John Odenthal, CBS News, 29 Mar. 2026
  • But there is a poignancy that comes with the sale of a place into which you’re poured your soul.
    — Thomas Farragher, BostonGlobe.com, 22 Apr. 2023
  • These are the roots of my love affair with my favorite team, joy and poignancy.
    — Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review, 30 Aug. 2021
  • The land there glows with poignancy about this time, when the old year is not quite dead and the new one not quite ready.
    — Christopher Borrelli, Chicago Tribune, 1 Jan. 2026
  • Frank’s background adds poignancy to the case’s outcome.
    — Dave Smith, Fortune, 1 Oct. 2025
  • The film is laced with dry humor but also poignancy and notes of melancholy.
    — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 19 Feb. 2024
  • In every episode there is humor and joy and lightness and poignancy.
    — Chris Willman, Variety, 21 June 2023
  • Time waits for no one, which is part of what lends the documentary its poignancy.
    — Matthew Carey, Deadline, 14 June 2024
  • That no one knows this now gives the events of this week a strange retrospective poignancy.
    — Andrew Kay, Longreads, 17 July 2021
  • There’s a lightness to many of the cues, but also a poignancy that shone throughout.
    — Melinda Newman, Billboard, 27 May 2017
  • The poignancy sneaks up on you, like a string section silently lifting their bows all at once.
    — Jenny Singer, Glamour, 16 July 2021
  • To me, sometimes the poignancy of their art is the distance traveled from it and their worst selves.
    — David Marchese, New York Times, 11 Sep. 2022
  • There was great tragedy about that, but there was also poignancy, and beauty, and substance.
    — Jason Wyche, Hazlitt, 15 Feb. 2023
  • There is a poignancy to this most reserved of women being forced to grieve in public.
    — Catherine Mayer, CNN, 14 Apr. 2021
  • Now that he's gone, of course, the life-and-death lyrics take on new poignancy, but songs like this assure his legacy.
    — Debby Wolfinsohn, EW.com, 27 June 2022
  • But the live performances found poignancy in the city’s spirit as a music town.
    — Los Angeles Times, 8 Jan. 2026
  • No playwright can duplicate the poignancy of that.
    — David L. Coddon, San Diego Union-Tribune, 5 Mar. 2026
  • When the tale shifts into a more somber mode, the performers deepen the poignancy.
    — Celia Wren, Washington Post, 18 Apr. 2023
  • Which, in turn, undercuts the poignancy of the bonds that the series rests upon.
    — Angie Han, The Hollywood Reporter, 25 June 2024
  • There was some poignancy to this, as my grandmother was a picture bride from Greece.
    — Los Angeles Times, 3 Feb. 2026
  • In Woodland’s case, the poignancy rested in his odyssey to become a dad.
    — Ron Kroichick, SFChronicle.com, 16 June 2019

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'poignancy.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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