Encountering a dead deer on the road is not an unusual occurrence; Oncoming drivers see the roadblock and handle the situation accordingly. Some drivers will swerve to miss the animal - it's safe to say that most drivers will swerve - but a select group of drivers will stop to move the deer off the road. An example of a driver in this select group can be found in William Stafford's poem "Traveling through the Dark". After removing the deer from the road, this particular driver must choose between the decision that his heart recognizes as morally right and the decision that his mind recognizes as logically correct. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay The driver, who is also the speaker of this poem, encounters the deer in the first two lines of the poem: “Traveling to through the at nightfall I found a deer / dead by the side of the Wilson River road” (lines 1-2). Even though he is not the one who caused the animal's death, he knows what to do with its carcass: "It's usually best to roll them into the canyon" (line 3). By saying “it's usually better…”, the driver gives past knowledge of this type of incident; this is not the first time the driver has had to do such a thing (line 3). It is in the following line that the driver justifies his act of rolling the deer into the canyon: “this road is narrow; swerving could cause even more deaths” (line 4). It is clear that the driver considers the life of a human more important than the body of an animal; confiscating the body of this already deceased animal will ensure that no man will also lose his life. His intention towards the animal is clear and his actions were justified. In the first line of the second stanza, the driver prepares for his upcoming action: “By the light of the taillight, I stumbled back from the car” (line 5). His feelings towards the animal are manifested in the following lines: “and stood by the heap, a doe, a recent kill; / she had already stiffened, almost cold” (lines 6-7). By using the word “heap” to describe the dead doe, a connotation of trash was achieved (line 6). The driver describes this dead animal as one would describe a pile of rubbish; in doing so, he remains impersonal, keeping his emotions away from the current situation. Her detachment from the current situation is evident in the first half of the eighth line: “I dragged her away.” This half-line reinforces the connotation of filth through the action of the driver; he “dragged” the doe off the road like he would drag a trash bag to the dumpster (line 8). It is in the second half of line eight that the conductor's apathy wavers; It is here that the driver notices something in the doe that was previously unnoticed by him, something unforgettable: “she had a big belly”. This final half of the eighth line marks the end of the conductor's detachment from his actions; the driver's emotions are now involved. The driver could have ignored his new discovery and continued his logical action of rolling the doe down the canyon. But his curiosity was aroused, so he set out to find out why the doe's belly was big: “My fingers touching her side brought me the reason – / her side was warm; his fawn was waiting there” (lines 9-10). The driver is no longer impersonal to the doe; he no longer considers her trash. He didn't call it a pile or a ball; he immediately ».