A work can be misunderstood in a way that gives it a meaningful second life.

Being misread is not always a loss. A book taken up for reasons its author never intended, a song adopted by a movement that had nothing to do with its writing, can acquire a life larger than the accurate reading would have given it. Once something is out in the world, its meaning is negotiated by everyone who uses it.

This is worth remembering when your work, or your words, are taken somewhere you did not aim them. Sometimes correction matters, particularly when the misreading is harmful. But often the useful question is whether the new life is a good one. You can hold your intention privately and let the thing be useful in a way you did not design.