Thoughts on Julia de Burgos's Poems

When I first started to read Julia de Burgo's poems, I was a bit confused about her gender, as were many others in the class. The first poem that I read from her collection was "To Julia de Burgos", and as I was reading it I believed she was a male, because of the way she was contrasting these two different beings. In every stanza, Burgos began by describing an action by a non independent person (a woman), and would then contrast it with by describing how an independent person would act. Because I was very confused by this, I decided to research a bit about Julia de Burgos, and I was able to find out that she was a civil rights activist for women. Knowing this, I reread the poem, and was immediately able to understand it a bit more. What I found very interesting was how she pretty much contradicted her own behaviors. In the third stanza, Burgos states that "you are the cold doll of social lives,/and me, the virile starburst of human life." In other words, in her letter to herself, she is kind of telling her outer self that she is not an activist and that she dos not do much when it comes to social life. However, she states that deep in her soul she is the "virile starburst of human life", or that she is actively involved in society, just like men. The reason that I love this poem, is that you would think that as a civil rights activist, Burgos would think she shows interest both externally as internally, but through reading this poem, one could tell her true opinions on her own self.

When I finished reading that poem, I moved on and began to read "Pentachrome". I have to say that I was more surprised reading this poem than the first one. I just could not understand why an activist for women would say they wanted "to be a man". To me, it seemed as if one would advocate for women, it was because they were against that all the men get the praise and honor. In this poem, Burgos states that she wants to be one of those people "converting into heroes of life". In my opinion, maybe she was just tired of fighting, and hated how it was just so easy for men. Maybe this is the reason she wishes she were a man, in order for things to be easier like it is for men.

"My Last Name"

As I was reading Guillen's poem, "My last name", I found myself smiling and nodding, as for everything I was reading sounded like reality and questions that seem normal to ask. In his poem, Guillen states that his last name is a "password...that is handed to me...and he carries it on his shoulders always through the streets". Just like he said, a name is something that it is used to identify a person, but in reality, does it really fulfill its purpose? A name cannot tell that person's life stories, and the battles and difficulties they had to go through. Also, as Guillen states in his poem, a name is something that can not truly identify a persons ethnic background, although some people try to do so. But why do we have to carry this name with us always? Why cant we just be individual people with all different last names?

Vicente Huidobro

As I was reading Huidobro's poem "Ars Poetica", I liked how pretty much the poet was tryng to state that poetry is not just words that are combined together to make a sentence, but rather it is "like a key opening a thousand doors". I feel that poetry sometimes may not be the most interesting piece of writing to read, but it does have deep meaning to it. In the third and fourth line of this poem, the poet states "A leaf falls; something flies by;let all the eye sees be created". In other words, I feel that in these two lines, Huidobro is trying to say that even by using these simple words and combining them together, "the soul of the listener can tremble". Although poetry can contain simple sentence structures, the poet is also saying that word diction matters a lot when writing a poem. He states in the first stanza that some words can either kill or give the poem a meaning. I do not feel like Huidobro is trying to say that word diction should dominate your thoughts when writing a poem, but rather by using the correct words/adjectives, give the poem the meaning you want it to have. In my opinion, I think Huidobro is trying to convey the idea that poetry should be written in a natural manner, and not over thought.

How poetry should be written

Continuing on today’s class discussion, I thought it was really interesting to read Manuel’s Bandeira’s “Poetics” and be able to compare his ideas with Marti and Dario. What I thought was really funny was that Bandeira was emphasizing the importance that a poem not have difficult words/allusions that one would have to look up. However, as I was reading Bandeira’s poem, I really didn’t understand the meaning of the words lyricism, raquitical, and syphilitical. Because I didn’t know these words, I was a bit distracted from being able to understand what he was trying to convey. What I like about Manuel Bandeira’s poem is that I pretty much agree with it. I think poetry should serve as for poets to easily convey their ideas to readers through a short form of writing. Bandeira states that he likes “the lyricism of the drunks”. In other words, drunks just go straight to the point when they speak, which is pretty much what Bandeira is saying all poetry should be. In contrast, Dario’s “I seek a form” sord of contradicts Bandeira’s thoughts on how poetry should be written. In this poem, Dario uses allusions and uses lots of symbols in order to convey his ideas. He does not go straight o the point, but instead he goes through this whole poem not being able to exactly describe the form his style wants to discover. Similar, Marti’s poem “The opposite of Ornate and Rhetorical poetry” states that poetry should be spontaneous or “natural”. Through this poem, Marti uses many natural imagery and he states that ideas should be symbolized with imagery. In other words, it is the opposite of what Bandeira states poetry should be.

Thoughts on Ariel

Picking up from where we left our class dicussion on Friday, I thought it was really interesting when Rodo begins to talk about the education system. I totally agree with the class when we said that the information and concepts we learn in school are applied to daily life, but I do not agree that all of this information is completly necessary. I kinda feel society has put an obligation of each student in learnig the material. In other words, if you are in a group and something really common omes up in the discussion and you dont know what it is, you look somehat of a fool. However, if society hadnt forced all of this information into the others, you would have not looked like a fool. In other words, I think that you should be taught skills that are going to be absolutly necessary to the job/career that one wants to follow. If there is a student that is creative and wants to follow an art path, why spend the time in learning derivitives in Calculus class. In contrast, if the student has an interest in mathematics why not spend the time in learning it. Some may argue that if this policy is followed than most people will be ignorant of certain topics, but in reality if a subject does not interest you and you study it anyways, you will ultimitly forget it and you will have lost many years in trying to learn it. If students were allowed more freedom in choosing all of their courses, than the level of interest would be higher, as well as grades achieved, and all would be content. If you really think about it, it makes a teachers' life much harder when they have like 15 students that just fall asleep during class. The teachers will have more orrecting to do beacuse there is alot of wrong answers, and the class wont have a lively feel to it.

Ruben Dario

As we were reading some of the peoms by Ruben Dario, I was very intrigued by the difference in tone and message in the poems "Springtime" and "Fatality". If Mr. Cummings had not told us that these two poems came from the same poet, I would not have believed it. One of the things I love, is how different the first stanza in each poem contrasts to the first stanza in the other poem. In the poem "Springtime", the reader can observe that the poem is very musical, flowery, optimistic, and shows the beauty of nature. Dario begins this poem with the line "month of roses". This immedialty sets a positive mood for the rest of the poem; due in part beacuse one associates "roses" with beauty, and positiveness. However, when one reads that there is "no burden heavier than that of conscious life"(Fatality), it can be conlcuded that the mood from the poem "Springtime" to the poem "Fatality" has changed drmatically. Not only is the cntent of these two poems different, but the titles of them both contradict each other tremendously. It is beacuse of this reason that I was having a hard time trying to understand how these two poems were written by the same poet. You would think that a poet would go throough life with an opinion/idea and then just express it on paper. However, it seems that Ruben Dario wants to express contradicting emotions in these two poems.