Chelsea Eugene 1/18/13 ENC1102 Prof.

Martin

Flowers Journal Response #2 The story, Flowers by Alice Walker, is a coming of age short story, much like her other title, The Color Purple. In Flowers, a young African American girl discovers her first honest bout of how strong racism is in the south. During the story, Myop the singular character discovers a mangled body by the cove of where she goes to pick flowers. The usually bright and happy place seems to be dark and gloomy and has a mysterious silence, almost haunting. Myops day had started much like any other with her skipping around her familys cabin and beating her wooden stick on the fence to a beat only known to her inside her head. This is symbolic of how the loss of innocence can strike at any moment. If Myop would not have gone as far as she had to an unknown strangeness to pick pretty things she would not have seen the disfigured body. Although this would be enough to frighten any child she was not yet scared and brushed away the leaves to reveal more of the mysterious man that lay rotted. His cracked and broken teeth showed signs of possible abuse prior to his inevitable lynching.

Despite the brutality of the situation the young girl was seemingly unaffected. This may symbolize her actual innocence; how children are unaware of the dangers of the world beyond their eyes. When Myop gazes upon a new wild flower in her midst she stumbles upon a decayed noose and upon looking up toward an oak tree shading the area, she sees another piece. What allows the reader to fully become aware of her loss is when Walker says and the summer was over. It is this line that makes it final that after Myop has laid down her flowers, she has become less of a child.