So This is Nebraska

The themes of isolation, alienation, and connection tie together to create the wistful, longing feeling that permeates the poem. In many moments, the speaker appears alienated—from themselves and their surroundings. The self alienation is such that the speaker does not refer to themselves until Line 11, and, when they do, they use the second-person pronoun “you.” This “you” is ambiguous enough to allow the reader to wonder if the speaker is talking to the reader, to someone else in the car, or to themselves. However, the emphasis on personal feelings in Stanzas 5-7 makes it logical to conclude that the speaker is talking about themselves.

The speaker’s feelings reveal their isolation. They are in a car “driving along” (Line 10), at a distance from their surroundings. While they can witness the scenery, their mobility prevents them from becoming a permanent or stable part of the countryside. Thus, the speaker is isolated from their environment, and a growing longing betrays a desire to enter into that landscape of decrepit barns, abandoned trucks, busy chickens and beehives. The speaker says, “you feel like that” (Line 17), like deflating like a flat tire and sinking into that lazy, abandoned landscape. However, by contrast the speaker’s car continues down the road, anything but broken down, carrying them away from that isolation from peaceful and natural existence.