January 12- Ode to Tropical Agriculture

 Ode to Tropical Agriculture has given me a new understanding of how to read poetry. After reading the poem I had an incorrect understanding of the meaning of the poem. After I learned what the poet was actually saying about the poem I realized that I put my own ideas into the meaning of the poem. While looking back on the poem the meaning seemed to be so obvious and I was thoroughly confused on how I missed it so badly the first time. After thinking about it I realized that the first time I read the poem I had put my own ideals about what the poem should mean instead of reading what was written. This might have been because I was already struggling to understand the words that were written or because I didn’t even consider the fact that the author of the poem wanted to create more agriculture by destroying nature. Either way I came to a wrong understanding of the meaning of the poem because of my own beliefs and now know that I need to read poems with a more open mind.

Comments

  1. Seth TenElshofJanuary 28, 2022 at 7:31 AM

    Hi Victoria! I completely agree that it is very easy to interpret poems (or any written work) based on our own preconceived notions. I think we should be better about knowing the context of the poem before trying to interpret it - context has a huge impact on the meaning of writing.

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  2. Ben KaczmarJanuary 28, 2022 at 12:02 PM

    I was surprised to learn what the author was actually trying to say in the poem as well. While reading the poem, I noticed some things about agriculture and whatnot, but I didn't connect the idea that agriculture and nature were distinct from each other. I think we can both improve comprehension if we look at poems as a whole rather than making assumptions based on the beginning parts.

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  3. Illyanna M. TaylorJanuary 28, 2022 at 7:41 PM

    Victoria, I connect with this so much! Over the years I have been thoroughly confused on how to "properly" interpret poetry. Like you I think that I come up with an interpretation quickly purely based on my own opinion, and most of the time I end up being surprised and told I was wrong. I feel like poetry is a form of art that is meant to interpreted differently by each person, but somehow I am found wrong. Thankyou for putting these feelings into words!

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  4. Médar SerrataFebruary 15, 2022 at 4:37 PM

    Thank you for your post, Victoria. It is easy to get confused by Bello's poem, especially because it begins as a celebration of tropical nature before turning into a call to destroy nature to make room for agriculture. Only after reading the poem two or three times, one begins notice what the author is actually saying.

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