Are there any there language techniques (humour, parody, direct speech, puns, languages other than English, or old fashioned vocabulary) in the...

There are a number of language techniques that Wright
employs in "Smalltown Dance." One is indirect speech.
This is seen in the second stanzas in which the sheets, the "corridors of white," are
given voice and speech through. The sheets speak to the little girl that the narrator once was,
as she describes herself and her childhood game of "Out of Sight," in the first and
second stanzas. The sheets tell her that spiritually, she is as clean and fresh as they are
after their Monday morning scrubbing. They also tell her that if she runs quickly, before she is
seen running, she can escape the yard and play...