The Speaker

The omniscient speaker has access to multiple perspectives as well as to the future. For example, the speaker uses a removed and factual tone in the first stanza to convey the way that the farm boys (and most people) perceive the two-headed calf. But in the second stanza, the speaker reveals the way the calf is twice as capable of seeing beauty due to his two heads. The speaker knows that the next day will bring about the calf's death, but for this night, the calf gazes into the sky.

The Two-Headed Calf

The baby bovine in this poem is unique in that he was born with two heads. Giving the poem its title, the two-headed calf can be perceived in different ways. In the first stanza, he is referred to as a "freak of nature" due to the genetic mutation that led to him having two...