The Midnight Express train is a motif that emerges at the beginning of the novel, signaling to the friends that a change is coming: “[T]he train went by in a rush of hot air, […] As the last car clacked away down the tracks, he asked her what. ‘You see how big that thing was? It’s like a warning, right? Like ‘go back,’ she said” (4).

This motif then recurs whenever Troy is exploring his emerging mature identity, who he is, where he comes from, and what kind of man he will become: “One of the freight trains to Chicago. Troy shut his eyes and tried not to think about it. His mom’s words rang out in his mind: You don’t have a father. The train wailed in the distance. Running north. Running away, to Chicago” (83).

The train stands both as a foreboding unknown and the possibility of the future. Either way, something big is approaching Troy and quickly.

The birds and animals are a motif connected to how Troy is in harmony with nature and how nature communicates with Troy.

Like the train, nature seems to call out to Troy at the beginning of the novel, signaling he is going into a place of danger: “An owl hooted somewhere close.