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Posted August 26th, 2007 by Lynnette Meeks
After reading the all the poems, "Traveling through the Dark" was the one that caught my attention. At first, I could not understand why he would continue to roll the deer into the canyon after realizing there was a fawn waiting to be born. Why not save the fawn? Was there no chance of it surviving? Was he assuming that it would end up dead on the dark and narrow road? I can only imagine that he may have been trying to save human kind from an accident that could kill. Any thoughts?
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Rough Choice
I understand where these questions would all stem from, but being from a wooded area myself I kind of understand where the author was coming from. Many times I would be coming home late from work or school and would come around the twisting turns to my house and see a deer that had fallen to the same fate. I think the author had to make a rough choice. I think that they obviously had some compassion for the deer because they seemed concerned that it had not been rolled into the canyon as the others before it. There also had to be some level of concern for the author to take the time to stop and inspect the animal as they did. I think that after realizing that the deer was indeed dead they felt like there wasn't much more they could do. To try to bring the baby fawn into the world without a mother might have ended more tragically than the situation already was. In order to save the fawn they would have had to have more help than just the driver and would have had to find somewhere to have all this take place, and attempting to move a large, pregnant animal, who would possibly be bleeding would be way more than they may have bargined for on any particular evening. But it also gives rise to the question of fate, was it written in the cards that this should happen to the deer and its unborn fawn? Maybe having the author come across the situation and have to make such a hard choice was what was supposed to happen?
"Traveling through the Dark"
Lynnette, I think he didn't save the fawn because he didn't want to bring it into this world without its mother to support it. I don't know much about deer, but it doesn't seem feasible that a newborn fawn could support itself. I also believe the man in the poem probably assumed the fawn would only have the same fate as its mother.
Traveling Through the Dark
I mostly agree with Jonathan on this one. It seems to me that his reasoning was that the fawn was only going to create another road hazard for another car. Also, the speaker probably knew the reality of trying to birth an orphan fawn, alone, on the side of the road, in the dark; it's not a simple task that any old person can do. The last two lines of the poem are, I think, important ones: "I thought hard for us all - my only swerving -, then pushed her over the edge into the river." He chose, that day, not to swerve his car, but to get out and make a deliberate decision regarding this carcass and the fawn within. In turn, his mind was what swerved as he hesitated momentarily in deciding the fate of this fawn (there could be a one in a thousand chance that, had he swerved around the dead doe and left it there, another person would have come along and saved the fawn).
Choice concerning nature
I don't believe that the driver felt any compassion or sympathy for the deer and fawn. The author's choice in describing the dead doe as a "heap" and setting it on a dark, narrow, winding street sets up the character's dissociation from the doe. He seems to be heartless in describing the situation which leads me to conclude that the idea behind the poem is more about the decisions made by humans when it comes to nature. He writes that he "could hear the wilderness listen" which further stresses the importance of his decision. If another car drove through there could be another accident, so he chooses a car and technology over the life of the fawn and nature.