Reflection on Jane Martin's "Twirler"

Jane Martin’s monologue struck me by how many different emotions is made it feel. Even re-reading this short story I experience a sort of amalgam of feelings—innocence, surprise, melancholy, desperation, isolation, fright, confusion. 

The initial description of the baton made by her family, as her “Momma sawed off a broom handle, and Uncle Carbo slapped some sort of silver paint” on it, is deceitful in the associations and assumptions that it leads the reader to make. But while this made my think of childhood, the introduction to “Big Blood Red,” the horse that “clipped my wings” begins the string of hauntingly vivid images that characterise much of this monologue. And while April March’s relationship with God underlies many descriptions I only began to understand the extent of this relationship with “The secret for a twirler is the light.” This beautiful image of being able to “draw on the sky” is quickly replaced by the painful image of the batons falling and cutting the twirler’s hands. This idea that through self-inflicted pain they could feel more connected to God, as is giving sacrificing themselves, is a haunting one. More than anything this monologue left me feeling un-settled. On one hand I felt like I was gaining a deep insight in the twirler’s mind yet on the other hand I felt incredibly detached from what was happening.