"Howl" by: Allen Ginsberg

Drugs, Capitalism, Despair, and Generational issues. These I see as the themes for this long 3 part poem. It starts with his generation. Those of his peers struggling to survive and find meaning in life. Alot of them having turned to drugs, Capitalism has taken over and begins it's destruction of imagination and creativity, everything is done for you. All you can do is work with the machines to advance which wipes out all hope for personal change and growth only conformity as I have gathered from this poem. Life becomes nothing more then the consumption for all things materialistic there is no beauty in your surroundings or simple pleasures, its the drive for obtaining  more and holding on to possessions rather than dreams as stated " Visions! omens! hallucinations! miracles! ecstasies! gone down the American river! Dreams! adorations! illuminations! religions! the whole boatload of sensitive bullshit! Breakthroughs! over the river! flips and crucifixions! gone down the flood! Highs! Epiphanies! Despairs! Ten years’ animal screams and suicides! Minds! New loves! Mad generation! down on the rocks of Time!" It continues on this way but with the stance that the fight is necessary and needed as stated here "I’m with you in Rock land in my dreams you walk dripping from a sea-journey on the highway across America in tears to the door of my cottage in the Western night" while speaking to his old friend Carl Solomon.Simply its a poem of our nations destruction in the form of improvement and advancement. But do you think that holds true today? Though we continue to advance today's generation was born into a world of advanced technology. We are often referred to as the generation without creation, we have no individualism because we have all been sucked into the "land of machinery" from computers, to phones its as if we couldn't live without it because its quick and simple. We know no other way, nothing of struggle or personal growth, patience of the value of words. We no longer write letter we email and text and the recipient gets it in minutes rather than days. So were we born conformists? Isn't everyone born a conformists to their society and generation. We are already lumped together as a generation and given little options. The author speaks of the ends of dreams and creativity in his society, yet we know only this, work with machinery and speed, we are technology dependent and that is all we have ever known but is it really then end of creation  as he claims? Or could it perhaps be the beginning of a new revolution? A new way to identify one another progress, follows ones dreams, and make it easier to break free from intellectual conformity? With all that is around us we have more in terms of resources to learn and form an opinion. though our generation is in fact materialistic does that make us non dreamers or uncreative by birth?