Cartoon

Cartoon - meaning Summary

Woman as Collective Mother

The poem presents a single image: the speaker is drawing a "Cartoon" of a woman who stands for the people. She is portrayed as a large, imperfect maternal figure—"the Great Dirty Mother"—around whom many children cling, crawl, and nurse. The lines condense civic and familial roles into one figure, suggesting collective dependence, messy intimacy, and the human grit underlying communal identity.