The imagery of smallness
The book opens with the sense of sight depicting Danny's smallness. The author writes, "Danny had known his whole life how small he was to everybody in his grade, from the first grade on, how he had been put in the front row, front and center, of every class picture taken. Been in the front of every line marching into every school assembly, the first one through the door. Sat in the front of every classroom.”
Sight imagery
The description of how Danny sees the ball depicts sight imagery. The author writes, “Danny would put chairs out there and dribble through them like he was dribbling out the clock at the end of the game. Some nights he would borrow a pair of his mother's lenses so he couldn't see the ball unless he looked straight down at it.”
The imagery of Ali
Ali is Danny's mother, and she sees her son's dreams coming to a reality, but she does not know how to express her feelings. The author writes, "Ali saw what she always saw, even tonight, when he was out here with the fierce expression on his face, hardly ever-smiling, even as he dreamed his dreams, imagining for himself now, imagining up a happy life for himself, one he wasn't always the smallest."
