What does this scene tell us about the speaker's feelings about America? Why do the speaker and the speaker's father not feel lucky despite their attempts to marvel at America? Use evidence from the poem to support your response. heres the poem:
We stood awhile, marveling at America,
both of us trying hard to feel luckier
than we felt, both of us pointing out
the beach pails, the shovels, the sand castles

no wave would ever topple, the red and blue boats.
And when we backed away, we saw our reflections
superimposed, big-eyed, dressed too formally
with all due respect as visitors to this country.

Match the definition to the word for a better understanding of the paragraph. 1 money does not buy happiness or security. 2john ringling, one of the five brothers of the ringling brothers circus, started out in 1884 with a trained horse and a performing bear. 3for over forty years, he worked hard at the family enterprise, bought up smaller circuses, and imported new acts. 4in the 1920s, he was rated as one of the world's wealthiest men and owned every sizable circus in the country. 5over 5,000 people were on his payroll, and over 240 railroad cars were in his retinue each time the circus moved. 6at the time of his death, however, he was a nervous, unhappy man; he was also bankrupt and beset by lawsuits. 7his carefully built circus empire passed into alien hands. 8all those years of work had turned to dust. 1. business organization alien 2. group beset 3. without funds to pay debts retinue 4. troubled or harassed enterprise 5. strange; belonging to another person, place, country, or thing bankrupt