Home Run Edit 3.51 cider, river

[tectak]

That night the moon dipped down her crown, and glowing, raced us home.

She sped on hedges, skimmed the black-browed, deep-ploughed fields;
vanquished by the unseen wraiths that rise from hollows hid by shade,
to flash again through hedge and tree, on pallid, swirling sprites… These two lines, describing what I think is essentially the moon appearing and disappearing out of and in to the wild's shadows, show an image that I think would be better told in one, instead, with something else buffering this stanza. 
writhing like smoke, they fell behind then died in scarlet light.

We breathed and drank the damp fast air, so none was left for words;
just faster than the moon we rolled, with you and I as one. I feel a more impersonal identification of your identities here would make the two of you, dear speaker, seem more as one -- no "you and I", just an "us": 'the two of us as one?'

Our bobbing beam lit eyes in earth and grass and bush and tree; Better a comma.
each stare a star in moments lost to miles sucked up by time.
We neither gasped nor pointed “look!” as each bright light blinked out; Again, better a comma.
for this was not our time to dwell but time to journey on.

We smiled 'neath darker canopies as heaven lost to leaf; Somehow, I am bothered by this line. Maybe it is the image of two races instead of one, or the tainted grace of the shortened word, or the image of the odd smile suddenly appearing, or the evening heaven not really being any darker than the shadows, being themselves one grand shadow of its own, but rather the stars of the evening, or the faint glow coming from them, but I don't really know.
just faster than the moon we rolled, with you and I at peace. 'The one of us at peace'?

Familiar lifts and swaying turns made strangely known our path.
No maps nor guides could steal this sense, our bodies felt the line.
Leaning in advance of bends, we hugged then flew the ironed way; The break with the rhythm here feels easily solved: "Leaned in advance of bends, we hugged then flew the ironed way;"
as gravity reversed we rose, held by its weightless hand. This line's rather awkward for me.

Before us fell the hill to hope and warmth from welcome walls;
just faster than the moon we rolled, you and I…then home. Following the suggested omission of "you and I", this ending feels awkward -- not following that, still does. I suppose the idea of the oneness being broken into its two natural bodies by the arrival of/at home is fair enough, but the ellipsis being a hurdle to the reader's grand journey (and my, what a grand journey this poem is!) feels like, er, The Scouring of the Shire, only without the lesson learned, or the tension earlier set-up exploding, or the thematic element fulfilled -- just a general hurdle to the straight myth. Speaking of 'just', I also think that the just here is unneeded, though the clause it precedes is a good return.

Tectak
2012

Thanks for this, river. I completely roll over on the comma/semicolon issue. I use semicolons as pause inducers and read my stuff out loud...er...with feeling You are still correct. The "you and I" is probably a Brit thing whilst "the two of us" is more US. Nothing wrong with either camp but I am a Brit.
Edit with your grammar gripes attended to.
Best,
tectak