Conflict with Nature
Birney is considered to be the epitome of the Canadian poet. Not only does he write from a liberal political perspective, but he embraces all things Canadian culture in the text, not the least of which is Canada's astonishing natural setting. Birney places his poems in the outdoors, generally. He often depicts men in conflict with nature -- fighting, pleading, running, etc. His emphasis is on the rigid, unchanging aspect of nature. Rather than crush his protagonists in the realization of this immovable opponent, however, Birney teaches them to coexist. His characters always demonstrate a willingness to cooperate with the undeniable strength and beauty of their environments. If it's a conflict, then it's like a married couple; they're bickering over semantic details because they know they're stuck with one another.
Transience
One of the most beautiful aspects of Birney's poetic prowess is his depiction of transience. He weaves this theme into nearly every text, as any good poet should do. In essence poetry is only a discussion of death, the ultimate reminder of the transient nature of the material world. Birney's perspective upon life's fleeting nature is influenced by his extensive travels. He spent most of his life engaging in various trips, gradually influencing his point-of-view on nationalism, identity, and, of course, death. His poetry reflects a sort of alienation, often being told from the perspective of a traveler in a foreign land. Even his poems written specifically about Canada feature a discourse on the relative transience of the feeling of belonging. As a Canadian, Birney feels somewhat disassociated from any real feeling of belonging to the physical land because it all feels so temporary to him. Having seen so many places, he identifies with it all and doesn't identify with any of it both at the same time.
Loneliness
Birney writes like a man plagued by loneliness. This is seen in both plot -- many of which depict isolated men in the wilderness -- and prose -- individual comments made by the narrator. He has personally spent a great deal of time alone in the wilderness in Canada which qualifies him to hone in on the tragedy of loneliness. After all Birney isn't lonely because there's no people, but rather because he chooses to remain alone rather then surround himself with the people. Whether because he struggles with awkwardness or because he mistakenly recognizes the faults in other people and ignores his own, leading in turn to a sense of superiority and disgust, he chooses to forgo society altogether. In his poetry, these feelings are often expressed through narratorial comment about a particular character's situation or through the avocation for politically liberal ideas.
