PIANO AND DRUMS BY GABRIEL OKARA
In this poem, I would say it is very unique compared to the other poems I read before because Gabriel Okara uses a lot of symbolism, metaphor, and other figures of speech, which somehow creates a complex meaning to the readers. It is complex in a way that the meaning perceived in each word and in each lines may differ to what the reader is thinking. In the poem, the word lines "jungle drum," and "wailing piano" is referred as the two distinct cultures that is now present in Africa. The "jungle drum" symbolizes the culture of the Africans, while the "wailing piano" symbolizes the culture of their colonizers, the Western culture. In addition, the themes that are found in the poem include appreciation to natural environment, cultural conflicts, and the clash of two cultures.
As I read the whole poem, what really caught my attention is the part, "And I lost in the morning mist of an age at a riverside keep wandering in the mystic rhythm of jungle drums and concerto." Here, in these lines, I came to a realization that colonization does not only brought out the bad things, but rather, colonization brought two things, one is bad and another is good. The bad thing is that, colonizers will take advantage of the people they colonized and the colonized people experienced oppression and depression. On the other hand, the good thing about colonization is that, the culture of the colonizers are shared to the people or the country they colonized and because of this, countries who are being colonized clashed their own cultures with the cultures of their colonizers. For example, in the Philippines, before we were being colonized our lifestyle was always simple and because of the influenced of other cultures from our colonizers, our lifestyle change from being simple to something different. Like, when it comes to our way of dressing up, we have this so called "filipiniana" which clearly shows the influenced of the Spanish colonizers to our country.
I have learned in this poem, is that colonization affects people's life both negatively and positively. Negatively, colonization brought depression and oppression to the ones who are being colonized. On the other hand, positively, colonization helps influenced other people's life and culture, in which the culture brought by the colonizer clashes with the culture of the one's who are being colonized. In addition, I also learned that we should learned to looked back and appreciate our cultures from the past because this is one of the main foundation of our being and it is something that we should be proud of.
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