How we cite our quotes: (Line)
Quote #1
The old woman across the way
is whipping the boy again (1-2)
The woman isn't reading the boy a bedtime story, or making him dinner, or helping him with his homework. Nope, she's whipping him—and not for the first time either. Some home, right?
Quote #2
Wildly he crashes through elephant ears,
pleads in dusty zinnias,
while she in spite of crippling fat
pursues and corners him. (5-8)
This is a scene that would be perfectly at home on one of those nature shows: a smaller, weaker person crashing through bushes and plants while a larger, voracious predator chases him. And this is supposed to be a home? It's more like an uncivilized jungle.
Quote #3
She strikes and strikes the shrilly circling
boy till the stick breaks
in her hand. (9-11)
The whole home-as-jungle theme appears in these lines as well. The image of the boy as a "shrilly circling" creature, for example, makes him seem like a whimpering fawn or desperate insect attempting to escape the claws of a more powerful predator.