Anderson gives us a cold, spare scene with two figures. A woman walks all night on a frozen road, “insane” in the sense that she is driven by feeling rather than thought. She wants something violent and intimate at once—to love and to kill—but no one around her, least of all the self-satisfied “we” of the poem, claims to understand her. Those speakers are the heavy, sure Americans, unmoved by the wind in the corn. Then the final stanza lands like a blow: Tom has killed his brother behind the corncrib. The woman runs to him, sobbing and calling. She, who had loved and could not kill, is drawn toward the man who did. The mood is eerie and withholding; the poem leaves her motive dark, suggesting forces of desire and violence a respectable community cannot name.
The Lover — Summary
All night she walked and dreamed on the frozen road, She the insane one, feeling not thinking. All night she walked and wanted to Kill, Wanted to love and kill. What did she want? Nobody knew. None of us knew why she wanted To kill.
We were the heavy ones, heavy and sure. The wind in the cornfields moved us not. We the Americans, worthy and sure, Worthy and sure of ourselves.
Tom killed his brother on Wednesday night, Back of the corncrib, under the hill. Then she ran to him, sobbing and calling, She who had loved and could not kill.