19 pages • 38-minute read
So This is Nebraska
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Symbols & Motifs
Fun
Kooser has long been a proponent of playful and fun poetry, and in many ways “So This Is Nebraska” is an intentionally fun poem. This motif can be seen in the image of the rundown barns, filled with hay and cobwebs, and hiding “broken tractors under their skirts” (Line 8). A Sunday drive is also a relaxing source of fun for many, just as the pickup truck itself seems to be enjoying a type of fun: it “kicks its fenders off” (Line 15) and “reads the clouds” (Line 15) like it does not have a worry in the world.
Stanza 6 also maintains the motif of fun as clucking with chickens and getting sticky with honey gives a childlike image, reinforced by the image of a man being cradled in the lap of a pickup truck. This desire to revel like a child in their surroundings escalates with a fantasy about “dancing on the road” (Line 26). And yet, as it so happens, the aspect in the poem that arguably has the least amount of fun is the observer themselves, who wants to join in on the rundown, uncanny festivities, but the most fun they have is waving out the window of their car.
Aging
In addition to the theme of change and acceptance, Kooser’s poem deals with the motif of age. The motif kicks off with “those dear old ladies” (Line 5), who, as it turns out, are symbols of aging barns. The barns seem to age like people, where eyes and windows can become cloudy and hard to see out of, and sometimes body parts, like the tractors hidden below, deteriorate with time. Pairing the elderly barn with the older women shows how all things in life—from people to places to objects—age.
In Stanzas 4-5, the motif of aging appears again with the pickup truck. The speaker presents the truck as old and retired. Since it cannot run anymore—its tires are flat, and mice are building a nest in its muffler—the truck no longer has to work and, like an older person, can retire and relax. Neither the presentation of the older women/barns nor the pickup truck sounds negative or patronizing, just as the image of the skinny old man is both tender and heartfelt. As a motif in Kooser's poem, aging is quaint and captivating—it is depicted as an enviable development.
The Skinny Old Man
The skinny old man" (Line 22) ties into the motif of aging, however, the symbolism of the man is multilayered. Besides age, the man symbolizes the speaker’s imagination and another unfulfilled wish. The man is not a real person in the poem; as the speaker pictures embodying the truck, the old man becomes someone the speaker feels they want to have sit in their truckbed/lap and wave. The man is another form of connection that the speaker wants to possess, and they imagine obtaining this connection in their head.
Additionally, the man symbolizes defiance from convention and an embrace of fun and change. Typically, babies and children sit on people’s laps, not grown men. Thus, the man subverts masculine norms since he is not virile or aggressive but sitting passively in the lap of the truck like a child. The childlike aspect reinforces the theme of change, as the man has gone from child to man and then back to this childlike state. As the man has returned to a more infantile position, it is possible to claim he is having fun sitting and waiting for someone to wave back—it is like he is playing an amusing children’s game.
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