Letting the turkeys go just caused them an even more horrific death, which is the high point of irony in the story. Boyle writes, "As I inched closer, the tires creeping now, the pulse of the lights in my face, I saw that the road was coated in feathers, turkey feathers. A storm of them. A blizzard" (Boyle 337). This is the ultimate irony of the story, but it is more than that, because it makes the narrator really see how pathetic his affair with Alena really was, and how pointless. He also finally acknowledges the emptiness inside him that Alena could not fill, and that is the ultimate irony of his carnal knowledge with this woman.

Even the title of the story is ironic, because the narrator is really such a non-sexual being. He has "carnal" knowledge of Alena, but little else, and so, this is not a real,...
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