After reading many poems, most having America as their main focus, I have drawn two important conclusions as a whole. First, American is always changing. For example, in Ostriker's "The History of America," the poem reads quickly. The imagery of the poem reminds me of a train running through America in her earlier stages as a country. Phrases like "Keeps moving" and "Expanding and contracting" are used throughout the poem as well. Second, there are many different view points of America. To illustrate, in Haugen's poem, "Home from America," the speaker in the poem has a negative perspective of America and states:
it was an awful thought:
if you went to America
you became
a different person
However, the Djanikian poem's speaker has very different outlook concerning America and states: "The air was colder than we ever felt, / and already these were wonders to us." America is a fascinating country. Whether it evokes a sense of wonder, or casts a negative shadow, America is always changing, and is always in motion.
Will, Are change and motion essential to the American Dream? And, if so, are change and motion metaphorical as well as actual? LDL
ReplyDeleteProfessor Lagerquist,
ReplyDeleteAmerica will continue to flow and change, which will ultimately impact the dreams of everyone. Therefore, these two factors will influence everyone's American Dream. However, because no ones dream is exactly the same, change and motion will have a lesser or greater effect on the specific dream it is applied to.
The factors, change and motion, will most likely have a combination of actual and metaphorical impacts on the American Dream. This is because the two affect both the physical and mental realms. For instance, physical changes in the environment could cause a person's dream of ending global warming to become either a reality or a failure. And, because our society is constantly moving and evolving, opinions and ideas about global warming could change. With new thoughts, the mental structure of the dream is bound to change.
In any case, change and motion will end up having a varying effect on any goal because the two factors will always have an influence on our world. Thus, change and motion are essential to the American Dream.
WR