Analysis of Poem "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner" by

Randall Jarrell

Randall Jarrell | Source

Randall Jarrell and The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner

Randall Jarrell's poem The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner can be found in many anthologies and is his most well known work.
Published in 1945 it drew directly from his own involvement with military aircraft and airmen during WW2.

The ball turret was a feature of the bomber aircraft, a B-17 or B-24, made of plexiglass and set into the belly of the plane. From
this sphere a gunner, upside down, could track the enemy, revolving as he let fly with his machine guns.

When the war ended Jarrell published two books of poetry full of his war-time experiences, Little Friend, Little Friend (1945)
and Losses (1948). He continued in his academic roles as both teacher and reviewer of poetry, producing essays and critiques
which are still held in high esteem. His book Poetry and the Age (1953) is considered a classic.

Randall Jarrell, outspoken critic, novelist, poet and cat lover, with a sharp mind and keen insight, published his last book in
1965, The Lost World, the year in which he died.

It contains some notable poems, amongst them one titled Next Day, all about a middle aged woman who one day whilst out
shopping realizes that she has grown old. It's written in the first person, just as The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner is.

The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner

From my mother’s sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.

Analysis
With only one example of full end rhyme, froze/hose, and inconsistent meter, this unconventional five line poem relies on
simple language, paradox and a disembodied first person voice to make it successful.

There is alliteration - my mother's/ fur froze - and some loose internal rhymes - fell/belly;black flak;nightmare fighters - and
a kind of pleasing music in the second line.

 First person perspective gives this poem a direct route into the reader's mind. This is the voice of the gunner, more
than likely to be a young man, summing up his experience of war in simple past tense.
Note the use of the verbs in four out of five lines:

I fell....I hunched....I woke....I died. We have a whole life here expressed in a strange, paradoxical way, as if the individual
concerned was merely part of some impersonal process, a mother's son born to be a victim.
 Themes

The Process of War

Soldiering

The State

Life Cycles

The Nature of Death

Sacrifice

Further Analysis
This is a poem in which the speaker gives a summary of events post mortem; it could well be a spirit still caught up in the
confusion of war yet expressing a calm if eerie need to be concise and true.

The reader is taken through the states of a timeless existence. Birth becomes death (and vice versa?) and the paradox of self -
outward, inner, that which precedes everything - is all but wrapped up in five lines.

You can picture the gunner inside that bubble, which is a womb in effect, taking off into the air, thinking of his mother back
home, sweating, trapped inside, vulnerable, like a child, about to face the enemy.

Here we have a soldier, part of the machinery of the State, bent forward in readiness to fire a lethal weapon; a sacrificial lamb to
the slaughter, engaged in violence yet helplessly captive, as if in a dream.

To fall from my mother's sleep - does this suggest a kind of embryonic puppet - strings cut, awkwardly positioned like an
animal, taken up into the rarified atmosphere above earth, where all of a sudden a rude awakening takes place and the 'animal'
(unconscious) that was becomes a human being again, facing a grim reality.

As the bomber plane approaches its target the now conscious gunner has to deal with the flak (anti-aircraft fire) coming up from
the ground and the smaller fighter planes sent out to confront and destroy.

Lines four and five are all about the horrible process of war, the matter of fact nightmare end to a dream-like experience.

The end line in particular is shocking in its imagery and is based on actual practice. A steam hose was used to clean out the ball
turret following a death. Here the hosecould be a symbol of the umbilical cord joining mother and foetus; or the whole idea could
be suggestive of an abortion or still life birth, of a human life gone wrong.

With the plane clean and ready for the next crew, the war could continue its cold, cruel progress.

WW2
World War II  also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. The
vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—eventually formed two
opposing military alliances: the Allies (the Allies consisted of France, Poland and the United Kingdom,
and dependent states, such as British India.)  and the Axis ( Germany and Italy). World War II was
the deadliest conflict in human history, marked by 50 to 85 million fatalities, most of which were civilians in
the Soviet Union and China. It included massacres, the genocide of the Holocaust, strategic bombing,
starvation, disease, and the first use of nuclear weapons in history.