William Stafford's Traveling Through The Dark

When reading a poem for the first time, it is fairly easy to view it on a literal level.

Nonetheless, after analyzing the purpose, tone, word choice, and figures of speech and how they

simultaneously work together, the reader is hit with a whole new perception of the poem.

William Stafford's "Traveling through the Dark" holds this characteristic. The poem is about a

man driving on a narrow road at night and his internal conflict triggered by an encounter with a

dead deer along the road. He immediately leaves his car and walks toward the deer with the

intention of rolling it "into the canyon." However, when he discovers that this deer has an unborn

fawn, the man is struck with an instant conflict. Does he push the deer off
He comes across a dead deer, and without hesitation, plans to push

it into the canyon. This clearly indicates that the speaker holds no emotions whatsoever for the

deer. Then, a conversational tone is thrown into the mix. The narrator is sharing and guiding the

readers through his experience. He gives advice in line four, "It is usually best to roll them into

the canyon." This supports his informal attitude and establishes a relationship with the reader in

hopes of allowing the reader to feel the way he does.

Several symbolic elements emphasize the theme of Traveling through the Dark, all within the

last three stanzas of the poem. The first symbol, an unborn fawn. The fawn represents the future

of nature in the changing world. Although the mother, or nature in present time, has been killed

the fawn still waits "alive, still, never to be born" (11). The fawn waits in hope that it will live to breathe air, in the hope that the speaker will save it.

However, technology is also competing for the speaker’s attention. The first three lines of the

fourth stanza make the idling car into a mechanized beast that kills nature. Some details