19 pages • 38 minutes read
On the Amtrak from Boston to New York City
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Symbols & Motifs
The Train
The Amtrak train is mentioned directly only in the title, yet it is the setting for the entirety of the poem. It is a means of transportation—a modern, high-speed marvel of utility and innovation—and a vehicle for tourism. Passengers are whisked along the countryside and are invited, like the woman in the poem, to view features of landscape and markers of historical or cultural interest. They cannot, however, directly interact with anything outside the confines of the train; passengers observe everything from a distance.
The speaker in the poem experiences more than one separation. They sit inside the train, behind metal and glass, untouched by the physical landscape. They are a visitor to this coast—a tourist by choice, traveling from Boston to New York City. But the speaker is also a Native American, one who has been made a tourist in their own land by the forces and effects of colonization. The train functions as a symbol of that alienation from land and history.
Walden Pond
Walden Pond’s connection to transcendentalist writer Henry David Thoreau and his book, Walden; or Life in the Woods (1854), has made the place a cultural symbol of philosophic contemplation, simple living, and love of nature. Alexie’s poem builds on the meaning of the symbol. In “On the Amtrak” Walden Pond is also a symbol of the tension between narrative and counter-narrative.
Walden Pond is part of the American mythos and the history many white Americans would have been taught, but schoolroom history may not necessarily point out that Thoreau’s time at the pond was made possible, in part, by the privilege he enjoyed. His socio-economic class and influential connections supported the experiment, and he could leave when he had enough of the life. It was also made possible by the gradual colonization of Native American territories, of which Walden Pond was certainly a part.
Don Henley’s name in the poem is also tied to privilege. A rich, white rock star takes up the cause, raising money and awareness to save the area from commercial development. Once again, while the intention may come from a good place, the speaker says, without colonization in the first place, there would not have been a need for it (Lines 23-24).
Diet Pepsi
In this poem Diet Pepsi is a symbol of American culture and experience. It is palatable and part of the train’s limited range of options—an adequate accompaniment to the “tasteless sandwich” (Line 31) from the food car. It is a corporate junk-food product with slick packaging, artificial flavors, and an army of marketers, and it is a symbol of capitalist success.
Diet Pepsi contrasts with the orange juice mentioned only three lines prior. Both beverages taste sweet, but the juice is closer to being in a natural state and has some Vitamin C to recommend it.
The poem does not comment on the choice one way or the other. The soda is background, part of the scene. America, like the diet soda, may be fizzy and likeable, well branded, and so easy to consume that one may not think twice about the lack of nutritional value it contains. . A symbol of American culture, it pairs well with the equally unpalatable sandwich, which provides a contrast to the richness of Native American culture lost in its erasure.
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By Sherman Alexie
