From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishelegiacel‧e‧gi‧ac /ˌeləˈdʒaɪək◂/ adjective literary ALSAD/UNHAPPYshowing that you feel sad about someone who has died or something that no longer exists He spoke of her in elegiac tones.
Examples from the Corpus
elegiac• Its wildness and this elegiac calm met, circled each other, and survived.• Given what he had to say, the elegiac essay was the best way to say it.• Richard always used to be seen as irresponsible in the first half and elegiac in the second.• Both catch the film's elegiac mood, bathed in southern sunshine but overhung with impending death.• Chahine Yavroyan's sound-design is a mosaic of distant gunfire, creaking hulks and elegiac music.• These are haunting and elegiac poems, in which expressions of sorrow and loss are given ceremonious form.• His elegiac tempo for the largo of the Cello Sonata allows him a sustained outpouring of feeling.• elegiac verse• The mood, however, is consistently elegiac, without the contrasts that might rivet the attention throughout. 