Daily Archives: October 29, 2023

“Reading a poem is part attitude and part technique,” implies that a balance of emotional attention and analytical thought is necessary to entirely engage with the poem. One of the poems of week 9 that I think I can relate to and understand is “We Real Cool.” The poem is about how they think they are “Real cool” by leaving school. Lurking late drinking alcohol and doing others stuff that a adolescents can’t be doing.  I think I can relate because in high school, I was, or I tried to be “Real Cool”. I frequently cut classes and l lurked late too. But then I realized I don’t want to be living in the street asking for one dollar when I have the opportunity to have a better life and now, I’m almost graduating from college

If I were to put the quote “Reading a poem is part attitude and part technique.” into my own words I would say that when reading a poem you have to leave narratives in the past such as, “Poetry is hard to decipher.” and “I have to understand a poem on the first try.” and have a more positive more outlook on reading. I would also say that you have to look for literary techniques for meaning such as alliteration, rhyming, and imagery. In class this week we read the poem White Lies by Natasha Trethewey. I used some of the strategies learned in the article to help me decipher this poem. The first time I read this poem, I felt a bit frustrated that I didn’t understand what the poem was trying to convey. But thinking back to the article I was reminded that I should try reading the poem multiple times and out loud instead of giving up. The article also mentioned how the way lines are structured can affect the meaning of a poem.  I encountered this technique when reading the poem. “I could easily tell the white folks that we lived uptown,” (Trethewey, lines 7-8” Reading both lines with no pause in-between you would interpret this as Trethewey telling people that she lives uptown. But when using breaks between each line you can also interpret the first line as Trethewey (who was often mistaken for being white) being able to tell who was white from who wasn’t.

“Reading a poem is part attitude and part technique.” I believe that this quote means that there is much that goes into a poem. While reading a poem, the reader must keep in mind of the poet who is capturing what can be an “experience, idea or feeling.” A poem’s meaning is not the only goal of the text, a lot of it is the relationship a reader forms with the poet. A poem doesn’t have just one meaning, understanding is part of it, and the other components are found in the way the poet expresses themselves. Such as, the rhythm and the shape of the poem.  While reading the poem “What lips my lips have kissed, and where and why.” by Edna St. Vincent Millay, I noticed a technique she used to convey her point of love and aging was symbolism. Millay describes her love life as changing seasons such as, “Thus in the winter stands the lonely tree, Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one, Yet knows its boughs more silent than before” (Millay.) In this quote, the poet refers to different seasons in the sense of different stages of her life. Readers can relate to Millay’s lonely love life she reflects on as she becomes older and reminisces the experiences she shares with her failed romances. She expands on her emotions of sadness with a tragic attitude of this text and towards her disappointment in her failures in love.

The quote “Reading a poem is part attitude and part technique” simply refers to having the ability to take right steps and maintaining an open mindset when analyzing and attempting to make sense of a poem. To understand a poem what it takes is developing techniques and critical thinking if the message isn’t clear. Having the right attitude generally is the key to overcoming many different problems, one being deciphering the meaning in a poem. An good example of a poem would be “White Lies by Natasha Trethewey. In this poem she recalls her childhood and the many lies she told which she believed were simply innocent lies, yet later found out they would prove to be more.  Within the quote “I could act like my homemade dresses came straight out the window of Maison Blanche.” It describe the type of image that she wanted to portray. A falsehood that she wanted everyone to believe. This poem overall message can be deciphered through the use of proven techniques and a good attitude.