Imagery

Imagery is a literary tool that engages the senses. Imagery consisits of descriptions that help a reader better sense the way things look, feel, sound, smell, or taste in literature. "Traveling through the dark" is a poem in which imagery adds meaning. From the title which also begins the poem we immediately picture darkness. This poem is packed with strong images such as "a deer dead on the edge of the Wilson river road," "roll them into the canyon," "that road is narrow," "by glow of the taillight," "the heap," "almost cold," "large in the belly," "fingers touching her side," "warm exhaust turning red," etc. In almost every line of this poem there is something that lends itself to the larger picture-temperature, size, the way something is handled or experienced, position, etc- and the reader feels as if he is almost there. This is the major function of imagery.