Pony

“I have already mentioned that Mittenwool is a ghost, but I’m not entirely sure that’s the right word for him. Spirit. Apparition. Fact is, I don’t know what the right word for him is, exactly. Pa thinks he is an imaginary friend or some such thing, but I know that’s not what he is. Mittenwool is as real as the chair he sits on, and the house we live in, and the dog. That no one but me can see him, or hear him, doesn’t mean he’s not real.”

This passage complicates The Tangible Effects of the Supernatural. Silas knows that Mittenwool is a ghost and is therefore invisible to most people, but he wisely reasons that the ghost’s invisibility does not negate his existence. Furthermore, to Silas, Mittenwool is even more important than most people because he has been an important companion since Silas was a baby. Mittenwool’s existence suggests that the supernatural and the real are not mutually exclusive.

“A violin? That made no sense. All I can think is that maybe life knows where it’s going before you do sometimes, and somewhere deep inside me, in the rooms of my heart, I knew that I would not be coming home again.”

In addition to being able to see ghosts, Silas has either psychic abilities or very keen intuition. The metaphorical phrase “rooms of my heart” suggests that sometimes Silas can feel things before he consciously thinks about them, as when he intuitively senses that he won’t be returning home again. This moment marks the beginning of Silas’s coming-of-age journey, which is primarily an emotional journey but is also symbolized through his literal journey through the woods to find Pa.

“Memory is a strange thing. Some things come to you crisp and bright, like fireworks on a long black night. Others are as dim and fuzzy as dying embers. I have always endeavored to provide order to my memory, but it can be like trying to put lightning in a box.

Still, I have defeated lightning, so there’s that.”

This passage complicates The Tangible Effects of the Supernatural because although memory itself is not supernatural, Silas still feels that it is impossible to accurately remember everything. Real phenomena can be just as difficult, mysterious, and unlikely as supernatural ones, troubling the distinction between the real and the supernatural. Here, Silas also recalls his brush with lightning to remind himself that he is capable of overcoming impossible odds. The motif of lightning is repeated throughout the text to boost Silas’s confidence and remind him that his capabilities can surpass his expectations.

“‘There are so many things I don’t know, Silas.’

I nodded, for it occurred to me that if life is full of mysteries, death must be, too.

‘It’s kind of like these Woods right now […] We can hear all the hoots and cries coming from everywhere around us. Branches falling. Creatures dying and being born in the darkness. But we can’t see them. We just know they’re there, right? We’re aware of them. That’s how it is with you, I think. You’re special, Silas. You’re aware of things that other people aren’t aware of. That’s a gift.’

‘I don’t want it. It’s not a gift. It’s a curse.’

‘It may help you find Pa.’

[…] ‘I guess that’s true. And it makes it possible for me to see you. That’s something, I suppose.’”

This passage highlights the complex interplay between the mundane and the supernatural by pointing out real things that cannot be seen. This quote is also related to Silas’s coming-of-age journey because although he is initially frightened by his ability to see ghosts other than Mittenwool, he eventually gets used to it and stops fearing ghosts. He realizes that most of them just want someone to bear witness to their existence or deliver a message. Once he becomes more mature, he is happy to be able to help them, and this shift demonstrates his personal growth.

“I regretted saying what I said to Marshal Farmer the moment I said it, but there was no going back. There was no going back on any of this, anything that had happened since those three riders showed up on our doorstep. I could no more unsay what I’d said than I could travel back in time. That was another thing Pa once told me: The world only spins in one direction, which is forward, and it goes so fast we cannot feel it. But I could feel it right now. The world was spinning forward, at dazzling speed, and it was only forward that I could go.”

After telling Farmer that Mittenwool is a ghost, Silas regrets his candor because people usually do not react well. However, he also recognizes that he cannot change the past because the world only moves forward. The idea that Silas is moving forward is repeated throughout the text to emphasize The Journey of Self-Discovery and Personal Growth; even when faced with challenges, Silas consoles himself with the idea that he is moving forward and will eventually arrive at the proper destination.

“She has no idea of the grandeur that lies inside your head, Silas. I’ve known people like that my whole life. They have no imagination. No fire in their minds. So they try to limit the world to the paltry things they can understand, but the world cannot be limited. The world is infinite! And you, young as you are, already know that.

He held up my pinkie.

You see this little finger? There is more greatness in this little finger of yours than in all the Widow Barneses of the world put together. She is not worthy of your tears, Silas.”

Pa explains that there is more to the universe than meets the eye and that things are more complicated than most humans understand them to be. He actively validates Silas’s experience by emphasizing that believing in no more than what one can see leads to an underdeveloped, overly simplistic worldview, such as the one held by Silas’s teacher. Although Pa cannot see ghosts himself, he believes Silas and supports his supernatural experiences, and this dynamic is important for Silas’s growth and confidence.

“‘Let us fight; and, if we must, let us die; but let us not conquer.’

[…]

‘Fénelon wrote […] that war is only ever justified if it’s fought to bring about peace. But our government isn’t fighting for peace. It’s fighting for territory. So I don’t think it’s justified at all.’”

This passage explores the historical background of colonialism and the various injustices that were committed against Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Although Farmer disagrees with Silas’s analysis, Silas argues that waging war to take territory from another group of people is not a justified type of violence. Instead, he declares it to be immoral, unnecessary, and even greedy. Throughout the text, Silas has an uncanny ability to critique the flaws of his society, and in these moments, the author’s broader philosophical message shines through.

“‘It looks as bright as the sun.’

‘It’s the sun that’s making it shine,’ he whispered back.

‘But the sun’s not even out.’

‘It sure is […] Even if we can’t see it, the sun never stops shining. Always remember that.’”

This passage occurs when Silas and Pa are looking at the full moon, preparing to photograph it. Pa explains that the sun is always shining, even when it is not visible. This is one of many instances in which the novel makes the point that just because something can’t be seen, that doesn’t mean it isn’t there or isn’t real.

“[Mittenwool] doesn’t know beans about himself, truth be told. And there’s no rhyme or reason to the little he does know. The rules of chess. A dislike of pears. His disdain for shoes. The only thing he knows for sure is that he doesn’t know anything for sure.

This is what I have come to believe: some souls are ready to depart the world, and some are not. […] The ones who are, like my mother, they just go. But the ones who aren’t, they linger. Maybe their deaths came too suddenly, so they attach themselves to the place where they last remember being alive. Something familiar. Where their bones rest. Or maybe they’re waiting for someone. They have unfinished business. Something they want to see through. And when they do see it through, they move on, just like Mittenwool said.”

This passage includes foreshadowing that hints at how Mittenwool died and why he is connected to Silas. He dislikes shoes because he died by drowning after forgetting to remove his heavy shoes to go swimming. He is connected to Silas because he knew the family of Silas’s mother, and he therefore finds Silas “familiar” and feels a desire to protect him, just as Silas’s mother tried to protect Mittenwool.

“It was a whole other kind of unknowable.

I suppose that somewhere in my heart of hearts, I might have known the truth. Or believed I would find it on the other side of these Woods. But the heart is a mysterious country. You can travel thousands of miles, over strange lands, and still never find anything as unknowable as love.”

Rufe Jones and the Morton brothers repeatedly refer to Pa as “Mac Boat.” Later, Farmer explains that Mac Boat was a notorious counterfeiter who used chemical printing processes to produce fake money. Silas doesn’t want to believe that Pa is really Mac Boat, but on some level, he knows that it is true. Because this view of Pa does not fit within Silas’s limited worldview, it seems more mysterious and impossible to Silas than the existence of ghosts. Silas also intuits that Pa created a new, non-criminal identity out of love and the need to protect his family from the mistakes of his past.

“In hindsight, I have realized, I am able to see the many connections that were unknowable once. That is one of the tricks of memory: that we can see some of the invisible threads that bind us, but only after the fact. Later, I would find out more about Sheriff Desimonde Chalfont, and what he was all about in life, and what kind of man he was. But all I knew as we rode through the forest back toward the Falls was that I liked him. I trusted him. And that, for the time being, was enough.”

This passage contains repetition from an earlier passage about Mittenwool, when Silas reflects that he doesn’t know how he’s connected to Mittenwool and yet he loves and trusts him just the same. Likewise, he doesn’t yet know how he is connected to Sheriff Chalfont and his family, but it is currently enough to know that Chalfont is likable, helpful, and trustworthy. In reality, Silas’s mother knew Chalfont’s wife as a child, but this will only be revealed after Silas goes to live with the Chalfonts.

“I have gotten used to a variety of mysteries in my life, to be sure. That I have grown up with a companion no one else can see is one. That I have visions and hear the voices of people no longer alive in this world is another. That I have been marked by lightning, and lived to tell of it, is a third. So I guess I have come to expect a degree of uncertainty in my life, young as I am.

But I was not prepared for Marshal Farmer not to be where I had left him. I had steeled myself for the prospect of his dying there on that rocky ledge before I could reach him, yes. But that he was completely gone, with no sign pointing to where he’d gone to? That was a mystery for which I was not prepared.”

This passage further complicates The Tangible Effects of the Supernatural because, at this point in the text, Silas is not yet aware of Farmer’s ghostly status, so he does not attribute the man’s disappearance to supernatural causes. However, he still finds it extremely strange and mysterious. In this case, his determination to find a mundane reason for the man’s disappearance becomes ironic when Farmer is later revealed to be a ghost.

“Pa would say that this is how everything in the world begins: with a trickle. A trickle of an idea. A trickle of rain on an acorn. Only love and lightning come all at once.”

This quote develops The Impact of Love and Loss. Pa argues that most things develop gradually, but love and lightning (which are both connected to the concept of loss) can develop in an instant. The text repeatedly notes that time only moves forward but that some moments seem more “charged” than others. In other words, some moments carry more significance and may seem to pass more slowly, even though time is still moving in the same direction.

“It is a misconception among people who believe in these things that ghosts are somehow all-seeing, or all-knowing. They are not. They are bound by the same laws of the universe as the living. They’ll know what’s happening in the house they occupy, for instance, but won’t know what’s happening in a house down the street. Not if they’re not there. Maybe they can see a little more clearly and hear a little better than we can, but it’s not because the world is different for them than it is for us. It’s only because their perception is slightly different. […] [G]hosts go places and come places, but they are not everyplace at once. They are not gods. They are not angels. They are just people who have died.”

This explanatory passage complicates The Tangible Effects of the Supernatural by demystifying ghosts and explaining that they do not have unlimited superpowers. By casting them as having the same flaws and limitations as living people, this passage also points out that perception is an inaccurate indicator of reality because it is subjective.

“This paltry country boy, with his magical pony, talking about Spartans. I knew nothing of the real world!

That much was clear to me from these last four days in the Woods. Four days in which I’d seen more of the real world than I’d seen in my previous twelve years on this earth. […]

I’d been spared that until now. Me in my cocoon in Boneville with Pa and Mittenwool. I’d been protected my whole life…That was why they didn’t want me to go…Both Pa and Mittenwool knew there’d be no going back for me. You can’t unknow what you know. You can’t unsee what you’ve seen. […]

And maybe, in the end, that was the whole point of it. Keeping that other world at bay. Preserving that time, the before time, for as long as possible.

I suppose, in a way, that’s the real world, too. The fathers and the mothers and the ghosts, the living and the dead, spinning butterflies out of thin air. Holding them gently in their hands, for as long as they can. Not forever, but infinitely. Beckoning the wondrous. But never for themselves. Just for us. If only for a little while. It’s not the fantasy of it, but the trying of it that matters. That’s the real world, too.”

This passage develops The Impact of Love and Loss as well as The Journey of Self-Discovery and Personal Growth. To protect Silas, Pa metaphorically “spun butterflies” instead of exposing Silas to the horrors of the “real world.” While sheltering Silas did protect him for a while, this dynamic couldn’t last forever, and in order to come of age, Silas now has to face the “real world,” which includes beautiful things like parental love and horrible things like Ollerenshaw.

“‘That was a good shot. You saved Desi’s life.’

‘I hope I didn’t kill the man.’

‘Well, I hope you did! […] But I don’t think you did, if it’s any consolation. That’s him firing at us right now.’

[…]

‘Which is why, if anyone comes down here, you have to shoot them, you hear me? None of this Gosh, I hope I didn’t kill anyone nonsense. This isn’t a game, Runt. No magical ponies are going to come rescue us, you got that?’”

In this passage, Deputy Beautyman’s words contain comic relief, alleviating some of the tension after Silas shoots someone for the first time and is worried that he might have killed him. This passage also contains foreshadowing and irony because although Beautyman argues that the “magical” pony will not save them, Pony does end up creating a life-saving diversion that saves the deputy’s life.

“Mittenwool closed Pa’s eyes softly. I could not even cry, for the wonder of it all was with me. To this day, and it has been years, I cannot be too saddened by the passing of souls between worlds, for I know how it is, how they come and go for us through the ages, in our lifetimes. It is not unlike Pa’s irontypes, I’ve come to realize. We don’t see the images until the action of sunlight, or some other mysterious agency, gives form to the invisible. But they are there.”

This passage develops The Impact of Love and Loss. Silas experiences a great deal of loss, but he doesn’t view death as a permanent loss because he knows firsthand that death does not extinguish love or negate the memories he shared with his loved ones. Silas also believes that his loved ones are still with him in some way, even when they don’t appear as ghosts. This idea is communicated through the simile of Pa’s irontypes, whose images, just like souls of lost loved ones, are invisible until something renders them visible. Silas believes that he will be reunited with his loved ones again in a similar way.

“Half my face smeared with dried blood again, like it had been before I entered the Woods. Not just my own blood this time, but also Pa’s, for I had lain my face upon his chest before they covered him with the blanket. This must be the mark of my destiny, I remember thinking. My face, half red, for I live half in this world and half in the next.”

Silas’s blood-smeared face symbolizes the fact that he is torn between the world of the living and the world of the dead, having lost the people who were most important to him. The narrative also implies that his mother’s early death may be the reason why Silas can see ghosts, as he is someone who was touched by death quite early in his life.

“I suppose to anyone who didn’t know better, it would have looked like Pony was carrying a rolled-up carpet on his saddle. They wouldn’t have known that in the green blanket was the quiet boot-maker of Boneville and the smartest of men, who could memorize books in one sitting and had invented a formula for printing photographs on iron-salted paper. They wouldn’t have known that inside the green blanket was the greatest pa a boy could ever have hoped for. Or that the boy was crying entire rivers inside.”

This quote emphasizes that the visible is not a fully accurate depiction of everything that exists, as many nuances remain hidden from public view just as ghosts typically remain hidden from human sight and understanding. This passage also develops The Impact of Love and Loss by illustrating how devastating Pa’s death is for Silas and how strong his love for Pa still is.

“As we rode through the forest, Ollerenshaw took sport in glaring at me with a most malicious expression. Even gagged as he was, he succeeded in unnerving me. […] I don’t know whether it was because I was riding his horse, or because it was my father who had been his undoing, but I had honestly never come across that degree of cruelty before. This is how well Pa had protected me, my whole life, that I had never come close to this kind of malignity in a human being. […] And as I witnessed this cruelty now, directed at me, I was stung not only by the action itself, but by the sheer malice of it, that a grown man would choose to spend his time trying to terrify a young boy whose father he had just killed. With all the ghosts I’d seen, none had ever seemed as devoid of humanity to me as Roscoe Ollerenshaw.”

This passage elaborates on Ollerenshaw’s status as a villain, illustrating the depth of his cruelty, which persists even now that he has been captured and has nothing to gain by taunting Silas. Unlike his criminal counterparts who commit crimes for opportunistic reasons, Ollerenshaw has a streak of real evil in him because he delights in tormenting a child simply to cause additional pain. As Silas points out, Ollerenshaw is more “devoid of humanity” and more of a villain than any ghost who appears in the novel.

“He lifted my pinkie. ‘You see this little finger?’ he said.

I caught my breath. He did not need to say the rest, but when he did…

‘There is more greatness in this little finger,’ he whispered, his eyes shining, ‘than in all the Roscoe Ollerenshaws of the world. He is not worthy of your tears, Silas.’”

Here, the author uses repetition to emphasize The Impact of Love and Loss. Mittenwool has always acted as a supportive figure to Silas, and he often fills this role by repeating Pa’s good advice and comforting words. After Pa’s death, Mittenwool’s repetition of Pa’s words is even more meaningful and touching, making Silas feel like he still has a companion, a supporter, and someone watching over him even though his parents have both died.

“‘Will wonders never cease!’ she cried as tears started flowing from her eyes.

[…]

‘Silas, you are Elsa’s boy!…You sweet, darling child! You’re Elsa Morrow’s son! And here you are, with us, out of all the places in the world you might have ended up! Don’t you see? Surely, it was Elsa who guided you here! So that I could take care of you! You will let me do that, won’t you? You will stay and live with us, yes? Please say you will?’

I was too bewildered to understand everything she was saying, but her happiness filled me with something I had not felt for a long time. […] It was a sense that, somehow, I had come home. Maybe not to the place I’d left, but to the place I was meant to be.”

This passage develops The Journey of Self-Discovery and Personal Growth, which Silas continues alone now that his parents have died. Instead of shutting down and rejecting new opportunities, Silas opens his heart and redefines his concepts of home and family, forging new connections and broadening his own future. This novel is also full of coincidences, which take on a supernatural quality; one such coincidence appears here, when Silas and the Chalfonts discover that Jenny knew Silas’s mother as a child. Notably, this connection is not the reason why the Chalfonts take Silas in; he has already been living with them for a while by the time they discover it.

“By now I’ve accepted that it is my lot in life to see these people, those who are caught between this world and the next, or are not quite prepared to move on. Although they often wear the wounds of their demises, and such things can be frightening to behold, I have become accustomed to the seeing of them. These souls look for nothing from me but recognition, perhaps a remembrance that they were here once, breathing the same air, not to be forgotten. It is a small price to pay that I can honor them this way, and occasionally talk to them, or pass on soothing messages to the loved ones they left behind. […] Even when they didn’t remember their own names, they always remembered who they loved. That, I’ve learned, is what we cling to forever. Love. It transcends. It leads. It follows. Love is a journey without end.”

This passage complicates The Tangible Effects of the Supernatural. Silas does not fear ghosts because they just want him to bear witness to their existence. This passage also develops The Impact of Love and Loss because, like the living, the dead experience grief when they are separated from their loved ones. The “unfinished business” of many ghosts is simply the desire to look after their loved ones or to send them a comforting message, emphasizing the central importance of love, which does not die with the human body.