“Tale of a Rodent” by Roger Starr The startled movement of a young woman in one corner of the bus shelter indicated that something was wrong. She moved again, a gesture of discomfort, even fear. Then I saw what troubled her: an infant rodent - perhaps mouse, perhaps rat - a small ball of brown cotton, with a toothpick for a tail. It had somehow crossed Seventh Avenue, climbed the curb and was moving through the shelter and across the sidewalk.
I say moving rather than running because the creature was too compact to reveal legs. Its speed was so erratic, and its direction so changeable, that it could have been a battery-driven toy riding on a hidden eccentric wheel. Another woman gasped at the sight of the little thing, children pointed, men went out of their way to avoid it.
To me it seemed more incongruous than scary, not merely outnumbered by people but intimidated by the hardness of the world into which it had suddenly emerged. From where? In what soft place on the other side of this busiest highway had its mother gnawed a nest in a fortress of brick and concrete, glass and steel?
Between the legs of pedestrians, the animal darted to the door of a candy store. Its feeding instincts were sound, although it could not poke through the slit between the bottom of the glass door and the sill. The instinct that had taken it to that store made its adult role obvious. It abandoned the candy store for the adjacent entrance to a large office building.
The superintendent, a bundle of keys hanging from his belt, was standing at the door. Rodent and superintendent vanished into the lobby, only to emerge moments later, animal first.
The superintendent kicked at it, driving the animal back to the sidewalk. Then he looked at me almost regretfully. Whatever the rodent might sometime become, the keeper of the keys knew it was not yet a fair match for the guardian of an office building.
The superintendent's kick must have hurt the animal; its movements became even more erratic than before. But to my astonishment, it crossed the curb and darted into the street, the traffic light in its favor. Unthinkingly wishing it safe passage, I saw it disappear beneath each passing car, then emerge again and move erratically onward.
The game - if game it was - was not to last. The light changed, releasing a torrent of cars across 44th street, and when they had gone, the animal was left motionless on the pavement. No blood, no gore, just a tiny dead thing, hardly bigger than a large beetle, in the middle of the avenue, invisible to any passing motorist. Moments later my bus came and took me home to my apartment house.
I felt I had witnessed something small, but supremely serious.
Draft an Evidence-Based Claim/a fully developed paragraph in which you identify Roger Starr’s purpose in his essay, “Tale of a Rodent,” and how he uses a literary/rhetorical device to achieve that purpose.

In your response, be sure to:
State a claim in which you identify Roger Starr’s purpose in his essay, “Tale of a Rodent.”

Identify the literary/rhetorical device Starr uses to achieve his goal.
Provide at least three specific quotes of your chosen device to prove your claim.
Be sure to analyze the device in each quote and how it relates back to your claim.
Include a parenthetical citation of the lines quoted (put in a parenthesis at the end of the sentence.)
Provide a closing sentence.