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Sep 15, 2020.

Part 1

Poetry Argument: Capitalism in the American Dream

In Quackenbush’s American dream, the idea of the American Dream is reduced to the

hogwash of imagination which in a real sense is hard to achieve without exploiting others. As he

puts it, in the eleventh line, “I could buy this shitty company and sell it to China if I wanted”

(Quackenbush, line 10 and 11). While his boss pushes him to work under pressure with threats

of getting fired, in his imagination, if he had the power, he would revenge by buying and selling

the company. In this, he argues that everyone has only their interest in mind when it comes to

achieving the American dream

A similar argument is made by Di Martino in worth it in which he reduces humans to a

currency being used for trading. In the eighth line of the poem, Di Martini questions our identity

on Google, “and who are you?” (Line 8) “Data as it turns out.” (Line 9). He refers to the human

exploitation by internet companies such as Facebook and Google, who profit from selling their

users, a perfect depiction of the man-eat-man nature of the capitalist society.

Kusnetz upholds the argument about capitalism in Harbinger. He sees the rich as the

enemy of the people since they destroy the vital resources needed to support life as they pursue

their version of the American dream. In his words, he states the rich are “annihilating what you
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need to stay alive for the accumulation of blind profit— (Kusnetz stanza 15). In this stanza, he

references the environmental degradation by industries owned by the rich, which is as good as

poisoning others. The three poems agree that the American dream is an illusion of success.

Everyone has only their interests at heart, leading to the destruction of culture and the

environment and the social structure that holds us together.

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Part 2

The image shows a series of steps headed to the American dream with several people

climbing the steps in the direction of the American dream. Everyone in the picture independently

climbs each stage, and the only person given a hand in climbing is a baby held by the parents on

their way to the American dream. The destination is not portrayed, but the supporting pillars that

hold the steps to the American dream appear to be collapsing. The message of this image is

synonymous with the argument of the three poems that the pursuit of the American dream has

led to a highly capitalist economy in which everyone is independently pursuing their version of

the American dream, and in the process, destroying the structures that keep us alive.

The image sufficiently captures the state of capitalist society; though no one sees the

actual destination of the American dream, we all match in the same direction as long as it is

headed upwards. In upward mobility, everyone minds their business, and no one bothers to check

the progress of the other as long as they get to their dream. As argued by Quackenbush, everyone

is in pursuit of their version of the American dream.

The falling structure that supports the American dream’s steps depicts the collapse of the

environment and other social connections. Kusnetz implies this when he blames the
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“corporations for poisoning the air, earth, water” (Kusnetz stanza 13 and 14). From the picture,

no one pays attention to their impacts on what supports them. While the structure breaks,

everyone is busy climbing the steps. These structures represent social connections, the

environment that feeds us and gives us air to breathe and water to drink, which we are blindly

poisoning in pursuit of success. The image and the poems imply that we become our enemies

since we destroy our ways of surviving in the endless struggle to achieve the American dream.
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Works Cited

Di Martino, Marc Alan. Worth it. Rattle 2018. https://www.rattle.com/worth-it-by-marc-di-

martino/

Kusnetz, Ilyse. Harbinger. Rattle 2016, https://www.rattle.com/harbinger-by-ilyse-kusnetz/

Quackenbush, Grant. American Dream. Rattle. 2020. https://www.rattle.com/?

s=american+dream&submit=Search