Regarding History vs. When Death Comes
Regarding history/ when death comes Luisa A. Igloria 's, "Regarding History" is a very intriguing poem. Initially it seems to be a very straight forward poem, she beings by speaking of two trees that she can see from her window that lean into the wind, and goes on to describe a certain meat that she is cooking. At first glance this poem seemed to just be a description of an afternoon, but as the poem progresses it gets more complicated, which lead me to start to question if her earliest descriptions where literal, or a representation of something else entirely. A key turning point in my interpretation of this poem is when she said: "Tell me what I 'll find, in this early period at the beginning of a century. Tell me what I 'll find stumbling into a boat and pushing off into the year 's last dark hours." It is obvious that she is searching for something, but what? After I reread the poem I began seeing more of a love aspect to it when I noticed her speaking of a person, who she wants to take the person 's face in her hands and "Grow sweet from what it tells". This once more brings me back to the begging of the poem, and my initial question, what do the trees represent? I came to the conclusion that the two trees represented her and this person that she adores, and that she is not necessarily observing them, but rather the trees make her think of the relationship with this person she adores and herself, which by the description of the how the trees are: "leaning now into the wind in a stance that we 'd call involuntary-" shows to me that there is a struggle of sorts that they are facing together. Another aspect of the poem that peaked my interest was the title. After reading it and rereading it there seemed to be no logical conclusion to be made of the title until I had focused on the ending when she talks about "the beginning of a