Question

Use one of the prompts below to respond to the poem:

I think…
I notice…
I predict…
I infer…
I wonder…
I understand…
I connect…


El Olvido

BY JUDITH ORTIZ COFER

It is a dangerous thing
to forget the climate of your birthplace,
to choke out the voices of dead relatives
when in dreams they call you
by your secret name.
It is dangerous
to spurn the clothes you were born to wear
for the sake of fashion; dangerous
to use weapons and sharp instruments
you are not familiar with; dangerous
to disdain the plaster saints
before which your mother kneels
praying with embarrassing fervor
that you survive in the place you have chosen to live:
a bare, cold room with no pictures on the walls,
a forgetting place where she fears you will die
of loneliness and exposure.
Jesús, María, y José, she says,
el olvido is a dangerous thing.
*El olvido means forgetfulness in Spanish.

Answer 1

I understand this, I connect with it also because it relates to what parents think or tell children, parents don't want them to forget their birthplace, that makess them forget who they are, they don't want us to play with sharp items, it makes them think we are going to hurt ourselves. They don't want us to forget our dead relatives, it makes us remember their legacy. They don't want us to forget our Christianity, and they never want our life to be boring and alone. Hope this helped you with this prompt.