Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Alicia Suskin Ostriker's poem "The Woman Who Ran Away" delves into themes of existential fear, disillusionment, and the human confrontation with nature's indifference and power. The poem's speaker, a woman who escapes the constraints of her everyday life, finds herself in a forest, where the initially serene landscape transforms into a site of inner turmoil and raw, untamed natural forces.

The poem begins with the woman noticing that "no beasts appeared, nothing bright-fanged / And allegorical." This suggests that the woman anticipated something more dramatic or symbolic in her retreat to the wilderness—a confrontation with some external force or a meaningful encounter with nature. However, the reality is much more mundane: a squirrel’s chittering indicates its irritation at her presence. This mundane reality starkly contrasts with any romanticized notions she might have had about her escape.

The woman continues walking, mentally distancing herself from the society she has left behind, symbolized by "their letter-openers, their crystal speeches." These objects represent the sterile, civilized world she has momentarily abandoned—a world of routine, superficiality, and perhaps oppression. As she climbs uphill, the woman observes the natural world around her—the "forest floor, past my bluejeans and sneakers, / Many divisions of brown, old needles, acorns, / Quartz hunks, enamelled moss." The specificity of these details conveys a deep attention to the immediate environment, yet there is also a sense of alienation as she feels the world she observes is "more virtuous than I."

This sense of alienation intensifies as she contemplates the "distant golden vista" and realizes that "everything was more virtuous than I, / The schist more permanent, the shell / Of the sky." The natural world, with its enduring and unchanging qualities, contrasts sharply with her own fleeting and fragile existence. The rocks and sky represent an unyielding permanence that she cannot match, highlighting her own impermanence and vulnerability.

The speaker reflects on her fear and the way it isolates her: "I was the only frightened one." This isolation is likened to a refugee's experience, evoking the image of someone who has "walked across Europe / Evading the armies," or like her grandfather who arrived in America, "Jew counting the cost." This historical and personal context deepens the speaker's sense of displacement, as she sees herself as both a product of survival and a figure burdened by the weight of past traumas and current fears.

Her internal monologue continues with questions of mortality: "Will I die soon? Why am I alive, / My body leaking heat, / Words of praise misting my lips?" These lines reveal the speaker's anxiety about her own existence—she feels disconnected from the natural world and from any sense of purpose or meaning in her life. The imagery of "leaking heat" and "words of praise misting my lips" suggests the ephemeral nature of life and the superficiality of societal rituals, which seem insubstantial in the face of her existential dread.

As the speaker decides to turn back, contemplating the safety and comfort of the city—"after all, I could / Take the car anytime, if they got too dreary, / I could drive back safe to the city"—the poem shifts in tone. It is only after she resolves to return to her previous life that the forest begins to reveal its more menacing and alive aspects: "Only then did the trees begin to hiss, / Boulders to roar, / Mushrooms to writhe from the wet forest floor." This transformation of the landscape, from passive to active, suggests that the woman’s confrontation with nature, and perhaps with her own deeper fears and desires, has only just begun.

The hissing trees, roaring boulders, and writhing mushrooms symbolize the underlying forces of nature that were previously hidden or subdued. These elements of the forest, now animated and seemingly hostile, reflect the tumult within the speaker—her unresolved fears, her awareness of mortality, and the unsettling realization that she cannot escape the primal forces that govern both the natural world and her own psyche.

"The Woman Who Ran Away" ultimately portrays the complex relationship between the individual and the natural world, as well as the internal conflicts that arise when one attempts to flee from the familiar into the unknown. The poem captures the tension between the desire for escape and the inevitable confrontation with the self, suggesting that true freedom or peace may be more elusive and fraught than initially imagined. Ostriker's poem challenges the reader to consider the limits of escape and the inescapable nature of fear, mortality, and the raw power of the world around us.

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