Power Of A House In Casa By Rigoberto Gonzalez

The Power of a House In the 1950s, in America, the definition of American dream changed as homeownership became an essential part of it. This still stands true today as many immigrants dream of one day saving enough money to buy a house for their family. Through the years, a house has become to symbolize stability, comfort, and even happiness. A house is simply a building of habitation but the more time one lives in it, an attachment develops. This attachment can be attributed to the sense of peace that it brings you or the familiarity of all the things inside of it or the many significant life events that have taken place inside of it. In “Casa”, Rigoberto Gonzalez creates an alternate version of a house that represents an America that is the antithesis of a comfortable, accepting home that many immigrants …show more content…
The house is adamant that it is “not your mother” (1) and is emphasized by the caesura. The house does not feel the love or natural attachment to its occupants as a mother has to her children. The house “will not be moved by grief or gratitude” (2); in fact it will not be moved by anything, as suggested by the alliteration joining the two antithetical emotions. The extent of the house is so severe that even men who are so helpless that they “weep like orphans at my [its] door” (3) cannot disarm its ruthlessness. The men are portrayed, through the simile, as those who have been deprived of protection, security, and family. Yet the house is so harsh that its is not willing to provide shelter and comfort in the absence of both as these are not seen as valuable things to the house. Many immigrants who come to America become orphans of some sort because many they have left their parents in their mother country in order to come to a foreign country with unknown prospects. Regardless of their lonely, unfortunate circumstances, America does not want to accept them as its own and provide the some level