Sign Inventory, B. H. Fairchild's "Madonna and Child"

• In the beginning, the baby seems violent as its crying "[rips] through the store like a weed cutter," then turns divine as it becomes "the harangue of the gods." Once she begins nursing, the baby's characterization evolves to be more calm but still voracious with what Fairchild calls "the great suck of the infinite." By the end of the poem, however, the child seems angelic, "asleep, lips / on breast, drops of milk trickling down."
• Fairchild juxtaposes the overwhelming force of the baby with the speaker's "grievous / late-night stupor and post-marijuana hunger" and their "sad little plastic baskets full of crap."
• The poem includes dialogue in both English and Spanish, but only the Spanish is direct dialogue
• The baby is compared to a boat twice--in line 24 ("riding her knee like a little boat") and in lines 28-29 ("plump cheeks / pumping, billowing sails of the Santa Maria").