Analysis of Jarrell's "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 rom its dream of life. I woke to the black flak and the nightmare fighters. When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose. "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner" by Randall Jarrell is a poem about a soldier dying in the ball turret of a fighter plane during what was most likely World War II. The poem tells of the fear of young soldiers being sent to war and th