American Dream

The American Dream

Jason Roberts who wrote a poem “Who Discovered America?”, describes about what is American dream. Also, in Enrique’s Journey wrote by Sonia Nazario, she depict a character named Lourdes who has a American dream since she was young, get to know American through the TV shows, and dreams one day she could live in American. When she finally got into American, she found out life here is tough and not full of happiness. The narrator and Lourdes’ situation are pretty similar, they both imagine their dreams through others eyes, they both fall in love with American, but at the end they realizes American Dream is not what is seems like, full of happiness, instead they have to pay a lot back.

In “Who Discovered America?”, the narrator uses a metaphor for America comparing it to a lover. At first, “I heard her story from across the sea…with kindness and grace of a queen...I crossed the ocean in a tiny ship” (line1,4,7). He was very appealed with her loveliness, so he made up his mind to chase her. “She was everything I dreamed of and so much more” (line10). The man felt so deeply in love with America, and now she means everything to him, she is his only dream and hope. “She breathed new life inside of me” (line15). The man has experience a new life in American; maybe he gets money, reputation and success. But “All she asked was my soul…she had a chain of lovers who died her slaves…with an ocean of blood for every drop that she gave. I never thought she could break my heart, but all her contradictions are tearing me apart” (line19,22-25,). In other words, American made him as a slave, he has to give everything to her, including his family, languages even his culture values.

In Jason Roberts’ poem, the man admire American so deeply, so he left his own country. Similarly with Lourdes, “On television, she saw New York City’s spectacular skyline, Las Vegas’s shimmering lights, Disneyland’s magic castle”(20). Lourdes saw American...