"In Goya’s Greatest Scenes We Seem to See" ... by: Lawrence Ferlinghetti

In this poem suffering is the over all theme. Specifically of those whom are American. Whether its the suffering we inflict of the suffering we take upon ourselves Ferlinghetti sees America as nothing more than a great landscape for suffering. He first speaks of war when he mentions "Heaped up groaning with babies and bayonets under cement skies in an abstract landscape of blasted trees. Bayonets are in fact a weapon used way back when in war. When he speaks of cement skies I cant help but think of industrialization. The skyscrapers surrounding us that are so tall and so close together it almost seems as if there is no sky at all or it is impossible to see. Industrialization is in fact the very thing Ferlinghetti apeaks of right after. Especially when he says "They are the same people only further from home on freeways fifty lanes wide on a concrete continent spaced with bland billboards illustrating imbecile illusions of happiness". Illusion of happiness? That really interests me  in this poem fact is It's human nature to suffer we always want more , need something and are never fully content. This is in fact how capitalism works. It feeds of our wants and needs giving us and outlet. The more we work the more money we make therefore we can spend more and fulfill our never ending wants due to the production of constant new things. However we are feeding capitalism this way because the more we spend the more money we circulate therefore the process begins again with the government feeding off of us each and everyday. It enslaves us and we allow them to do it because in a society as materialistic as ours we believe the more we obtain the happier we shall be. Our possessions define us even though it should be the other way around.  We are the cause of our own suffering as portrayed in this poem but we are too far in to change or even care enough to change. We complain but take no action. It truly is a never ending cycle of suffering one in which we cause ourselves and pass down to our youth from birth by immediately putting them through school with the sole premise of if you do well in school you will have a good job/career and be happy in life. How will that make me happy? It will only fuel my greed and our economy and that isnt happiness its suffering in disguise. Quite in fact nothing more but the illusion of happiness which Ferlinghetti puts out there.