Mary Oliver’s poem “The Journey” opens with a woman who is running from something. Physically she is not running from anything but nun the less something is holding her back. She refers to voices that keep shouting at her, causing the character issues in her life. In this poem, the character breaks away from these voices and in the process of leaving them behind she is able to find herself. At initial glance of the poem, most people can conclude that it is a coming of age poem. The voices at the beginning of the poem are a metaphor of society’s voice telling the character how she is supposed to live her life, but by the end she breaks the societal norm and becomes her own person. While this is an interpretation that can be argued for, evidence in the text leads me to believe that this is not the case; In fact this poem is not about leaving society’s norms, but truly about a people pleasing woman realizing that she cannot live a life where she gravels at everyone needs while neglecting her own. By looking at the way Oliver uses literally devices such as metaphor and narrative we can unlock the true meaning of the poem which is so much more that a societies’ ball and chain.

“One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began,” the start of the poem describes a moment, although you don’t know what event took place, it is clear that something drastic has occurred to invoke a life change. This is the start of the characters journey to finding her own path. If this was a coming of age story I don’t believe this moment would have happened, it would be more of a feeling of being in the wrong place your whole life. Then she feels a tug at her ankles by these “voices”. This is something that she feels is physically holding her back, in my theory of this being a people pleasing woman, she would be crippled by the thought of people being disappointed in her if she refused to take on their task. This accounts for the feeling of being tugged at the ankles because her anxiety is literally holding her back from saying no to anyone asking for something. You could argue that a young adult could feel the constraints of society holding them back from being their own person but the reality is that having anxiety can quite literally and physically hold you back as to where just the feeling of being controlled by societies rules is easier to break free from.  On the 12th line Oliver writes “but you didn’t stop” this is the character pushing past all barriers in front of her - not letting them hold her back like they have in the past. This is a yet another very important moment in the character’s life. She decided here in this very moment not to turn back, to not give up on her journey, to not go back to a life where she places herself on a back burner only worrying about fulfilling other’s needs. Whereas if you were braking out of the bubble that society creates, it abruptly happens. Mary Oliver’s poem is called the journey and that is exactly what the character is on. It’s a journey that takes time and has barriers that she will need to overcome. It is not something she can just step out of, it is a life changing journey to create her new self. The poem talks about a house trembling, wind piercing, and fallen branches and stones, these are the barrios that I am talking about, there are no literal branches and stones that she keeps tripping up on but they are a metaphor for the obstacles she faces on her path to a self-discovery. Little by little she gets past these obstacles and leaves the “voices” or people who had a negative impact in her life behind. At this point there is another moment where it is described like the sun finally peering through the dark clouds that hung over her life; this moment signifies the final stage of her journey, she is finally at a point where she does not feel the need to focus on other’s needs. In the other point of view the obstacles still exist, but they aren’t ones you have to climb over its more of brushing people off while focusing on your own happiness.  In the point of the sun and clouds, it would not happen at the end of the journey, when you escape societies claws you are either accepted or you are not. There will not be some magical moment down the road where suddenly everything changes. The voices that had been holding our character back the whole time have now disappeared and at the end of her journey she finds herself or “voice” as Oliver puts it. And this voice is now what keeps her company instead of the people who had previously held her back. In the contrary theory, finding your own voice makes since as evidence but they really you have a voice the whole time you are just too afraid to let it out, and once you expose yourself as who you really are you find others like yourself. As to where I believe that our character didn’t know who she was before this “journey”, she was so engulfed in pleasing the needs of others that what she wanted and who she was had disappeared completely. At this time our character needs to be focusing on herself so the fact that she is staying in solitude is good for her. “Determined to do the only thing you could do - determined to save the only life you could save.” This last sentence is powerful in the effects that it really shows that our character was dying on the inside from being people’s servant. She has no real effect on these others people life but helping them all the while that is what was killing her.

Mary Oliver tells a great story throughout her poem which further leads me to believe  my theory that this is about a people pleasing woman crippled with anxiety. We can look to the metaphor and significance of the “voices” that recur thought out the poem to enhance the evidence. The first instance in which we are introduced to these “voices” is in the third line. “Though the voices around you kept shouting” in my interpretation I see the voices as people you are always calling on her to doing something they needed. The usage of the word shouting leads me to believe that our character is somewhat afraid of these voices and this is where her anxiety would come in. She is scared to make these shouting voices angary at her so under any cost she is going to do as they say, even if that means neglecting to take care of her own needs. Further down the poem the “voices” are mentioned again; this time they are asking for something. “Mend my life. Each voice cried” Our character is trying to walk away from a life of servitude but the “voices” are what’s holding her back, this is their last ditch effort to try keeping her from escaping but our character is stronger than that. In this instances she doesn’t stop, she continues on her journey into rediscovering who she is. And that brings us to the last moment the “voices” last appear in the poem. She now leaves these voices behind; they have no hold on her anymore. This is when a new voice emerges, but for the first time it is our characters. She has been commanded by these “voices” for so long that she forgot that she even had a voice of her own and throughout the process of leaving the people who her holding her back behind, she found herself once again.

Mary Oliver crates an extremely vivid poem portraying a story of a woman who has been serving the needs of others for a majority of her life and had developed significant anxiety about rejecting a request of anyone who ask. Something happens, which we do not know, that leads our character to decide to walk away from her current life. Our character has to make her way through a journey that contains obstacles that she must overcome, but at the end becomes a new woman who rediscovers her own voice which she had so long ago forgotten she had. While looking at this poem at a first glace it can be thought of as a coming of age story or breaking away from societies bounds but after diving into it for a deeper look we can see that through the actual story contained within the poem mixed with the use of metaphor this poem is more specifically depicting a woman leaving behind a life of restriction and in the process rediscovers what it feels like to put yourself above the needs of others.   
