Part 1 of Essay
The entire poem is a metaphor taken literally it can be considered just a short story about a man stranded on a beach. He wakes up early in the morning, awake and very alive, he goes to sleep feeling secure. He learns how to survive by eating porcupine bellies and keeping their quills as a prize for his hunting and surviva ....

Part 2 of Essay
.... thus the reference to keeping the quills in his hat. In the third stanza Birney shows us through a series of metaphorical actions the characters evolution in his attitude towards the entire situation. At first our character is still unsure and alert at all that is happening around him, “ At first he was out with the dawn.” Yet he becomes more and more sure of himself and feels very secure, “ A guard of goat before falling asleep on its feet at sundown.” Earle Birney uses the goat as a metaphor for security bec ....