Deer Hit

“In the Secular Night“ by Margaret Atwood (1995)

This second-person narrative also begins, like “Deer Hit,” with a specific location and time of day in the first two lines. Also like “Deer Hit,” “In the Secular Night” constitutes a true second-person point of view. Other poems may have brief second-person sections, or may have an implied first-person speaker addressing a single person who is not the reader. In Atwood’s poem and in Loomis’s, the second-person narrative stands in for a first-person experience. In “Deer Hit,” details from the accident and its aftermath tell the reader that the “you” really means the driver of the car, avoiding the “I” to cultivate sympathy, to suggest parallel experience, or simply to avoid accountability. Here, Atwood also recounts intimate detail suggesting this “you” replaces the speaker’s “I” in moments like “You took a large scoop of vanilla ice-cream / and filled up the glass with grape juice” (Lines 9-10). Both poems derive some irony from portraying an isolated figure speaking in second person, as if the only other person in their worlds lives in the mirror.

“Self-Portrait Astride a Zamboni“ by Sally Dawidoff (2011)

This is another poem featuring youthful bad decisions, alcohol and driving, and transgression for the sake of effect. The mood of Dawidoff’s poem, however, shows self-awareness and self-effacing humor. The narrative of a Zamboni theft almost parodies risk-taking behavior in its awkward, relatively harmless absurdity.

“Cherrylog Road“ by James Dickey (1963)

James Dickey’s poem addresses machines and speed, embracing the possible destruction as well. This poem finds a life-force in that power, something generative and celebratory. While “Deer Hit” offers a central figure who inhabits isolation and frustration, who links his identity to ruin, “Cherrylog Road” sees life and narrative in “the parking lot of the dead” (Line 25), identifying with wildness rather than destroying it. Elements of Romanticism and realism at work, the driver of “Cherrylog Road” sees himself reflected in wild nature and in the power of the machine, “wild to be wreckage forever” (Line 108).

“Bonfire“ by Katie Hartstock (2016)

Katie Hartstock’s “Bonfire” also uses second person to convey some of the same menace as “Deer Hit,” This work describes an unsteady relationship with nature as well; though not as violent as “Deer Hit,” the wood in the bonfire “yelps” in Line 16, and the trick against smoke, the repeated “I love rabbits,” echoes like a superstition or spell.