
Life is full of struggles, and while most people dream of an easier life, Oprah Winfrey says it bluntly, “Where there is no struggle, there is no strength” (Winfrey). As she says, surviving the struggle makes you stronger, no matter how painful or unpleasant, so trying to avoid these situations is aimless because at one point or another almost everyone will face an unwanted strife. However, there is one common strife that nearly every person will face: Finding themselves. This process is almost never the same between any two people, but it does have the same ending result. Each individuals journey has its own complications and anyone that has been through it has a different story to tell. This particular example of someone’s personal trail to find themselves is written by Mary Oliver, and is a good demonstration about what this ordeal could look like. The reason this poem demonstrates what someone could expect to come across while undergoing this venture is because of the literary tools that Mary Oliver employs thought this literary work.  This piece uses personification and structure to show the journey one takes when finding themselves to explain that it is a long, complicated process and has both internal and external elements that affect this personal growth. 

With this entire poem written by Mary Oliver, she often uses personification to demonstrate how personal growth can be both an internal and external struggle. Throughout her writing, she uses personification frequently to describe the voices that people deal with, whether they be discouraging or supportive. She gives the voices a human form to make the abstract idea of a voice more relatable and fit into the journey metaphor. In the poem, the voices she describes are often people that are met along the way on this journey of personal growth, something that everyone goes through at various points in life.  When Oliver does this, she does in a variety of ways, but most importantly is the way she describes voices that are external and internal. 

The way Mary describes external voices in this piece is generally in a negative sense. She tells that there will be obstacles to overcome that are uncontrollable, and will have to be surpassed like the protagonist did in this poem in order to make it on this journey. One example of Oliver personifying external struggles on this journey is when she writes, “though the voices around you / kept shouting / their bad advice” (Line 3-5). This example distinctly depicts the voices as people around you who do not wish for you to further your journey and 

reach the end. The voices are described as literal people, however in real life the external obstructions that you could face are not always human. This process of growth could be hindered by many different factors that are independent of you, such as time, distance, or even culture. While the physical factors that can be observed by the eye are often easily recognized as an obstruction, they are not always the most difficult to overcome. There is another type of obstruction that can come between us and success on this journey. 

The other type of interference that one would encounter on a journey such as this would be internal voices that appear along the way. The new voice is introduced directly after the darkest part of the poem, when the journey starts to seem hopeless. This point is the apex of the story because this is the last time you hear about the other voices, instead you only hear about a new voice. The old voices in this story are left behind as the protagonist makes process in his journey. In the story when the narrator says, “But little by little, / as you left their voices behind” (Oliver) the image of the main character literally walking away from the people that are holding him back leaves a powerful idea in its wake. It shows that he or she has made a breakthrough in their personal growth, and is on track to make it to the destination with the help of a new friend. This new friend is a voice that is welcome and the journeyer is willing to take on the world with, which Oliver makes clear when she wrote, “there was a new voice / which you slowly / recognized as your own, / that kept you company / as you strode deeper and deeper into the world” (Lines 27-32). This quote from the poem is the light at the end of the tunnel that the protagonist has been looking for and is trying to reach. After Mary introduces the internal voices in this poem, there is a feeling that the journey has taken a turn for the better, this is because she associates the internal voices with finding yourself. The entire journey has been one of self-realization where the main character is looking for their true voice. The author leads up to this slowly through the poem in order to have one specific point that the protagonist realizes the purpose of the journey, but also so that readers have that same feeling of realizing that the poem is about finding one’s voice. Anyone that embarks on this journey is truly searching for themselves in this world full of people. Once you find yourself it is hard to imagine retrospectively why it was so complicated and rigorous, however this is the hindsight bias that the author is trying to show us. It is easy to understand the factors that hinder progress along the journey once it is understood where the end is.

Structure can also hint at the true meaning of a literary piece, and can reveal more of what the author wants readers to understand. In this poem, structure is used to reinforce the 

idea of the journey that the reader is watching unfold. Between this use of structure and personification it creates a whole image of someone on classic journey like a hero in a classic piece of literature. The entire poem is written in short lines, that once all put together resembles a path, similar to the one described within the poem. This is similar to the external factors talked about above, where at times the journey may come to sections of this “path” that seem to narrow to get through, however with perseverance it can be done. The author does this for the same purpose that she uses personification in order to bring life to the voices. Another way that structure is used to describe the journey is how Oliver breaks up the sentences. She often leaves short bits of sentences on their own line, for both dramatic effect, but also because when these are read by themselves and out of context still describe a journey. When Oliver writes, “But you didn’t stop,” (Line 12), it is easy to recognize that the person being referred to is overcoming a challenge that otherwise would obstruct their way. Context is barely necessary to come to this conclusion, however with context in this case, the readers are lead to think about what is possible to do once overcoming all of their physical and mental blocks. Within this story, Oliver even uses personification and structure together to further the lesson of finding one’s true voice. In the story when the protagonist is dealing with the external obstacles she uses both of these literary tools, Mary Oliver writes, “’Mend my life!’ / the voices cried” (Lines 10-11). Here the voices are given a voice that be envisioned but also the way that it is broken into two lines leaves it with two meanings. The first is more obvious, when you read the lines together it is like the voices are asking for the help of our main character. On the other side, if you read them separately like they are printed in the story, it sounds as if the protagonist is asking for help from someone else to mend his life and the voices are around him crying and not able to help him. With both of these meanings it adds to the meaning of this story because not only is our journeyer seeking help but everyone around him is. Everyone wants help on this journey, however only one person is able to provide this support and that is oneself. All of these examples of structure that Oliver uses when crafting her poem demonstrate that this journey is not easy with the obstacles to overcome and is hardly ever a quick one. Structure and personification are both similar in the sense that they provide readers with the ability to use the words and create an image in their heads. Structure helps create a tone for the film that the brain creates and personification takes abstract ideas, like the voices in this story, and makes them easier for us to understand by making them more similar to us. 

In this piece of literature Mary Oliver describes to her readers that the journey of finding one’s true self is hardly ever an easy process; however, it is a process that is worthwhile. She employs literary tools in an effort to engage audiences and give her work the credibility that someone undergoing this journey would need to understand that she has been there too. She uses personification to great lengths to not only help describe the obstacles that will be faced, but to also show what the end should look like. To add to this the author adds in clever structure to help shape reader’s opinion on the task the main character faces. This is employed because it makes the reader use their brain to put themselves into the story and relate it back to themselves. It is because of these devices that Mary Oliver’s poem has a dramatic affect that anyone can identify with and relate to. 
