"He cradled the wolf in his arms and lowered her to the ground..." The main character struggles to overcome a tremendous amount of grief and sorrow which is brought to him by the death of this wolf. The author wants to make it clear that the main character will do anything to make sure he finds a perfect burial site for this wolf that he cared so much about.
There is a very elaborate imagery portrayed to get the reader to have a sense of where he has stopped for the night. This imagery emphasizes that he is a weary traveler looking for a place to bury this wolf. McCarthy's initial message that the traveler is looking for the perfect place to bury this wolf that meant so much to him, however his mind gets changed when he begins to daydreams and realizes that the wolf is already dead and in a better place (heaven); "he took up her head out of the leaves and held it, or he reached to hold what cannot be held, what already ran among the mountains."
The coyotes are very symbolic in this passage because although you do not know whether they are responsible for the wolfs death directly McCarthy's diction implies that they are an annoyance to the traveler and they adding to his pain and sorrow. McCarthy mentions the coyotes over and over again until finally the traveler sees that he no longer needs to feel any more pain. "Where she ran the cries of the coyotes clapped shut as if a door had closed upon them."
Death is inevitable, and no matter how much sorrow is caused by death, life will always go on. McCarthy uses multiple literary techniques to get this message across while describing the experiences the traveler had to overcome.
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