The poem opens with a stark pairing: a boy and a gun, and beside them a "kept rose." The rose suggests tenderness or something carefully tended, so the boy seems to hold both violence and gentleness, or the possibility of either. The title, "Shooter," hints at which way things may go, but the poem never describes any act. It leaves us waiting in the quiet.
The "afternoon arithmetic" of "subtraction and division" reads like a grim lesson. Subtraction suggests lives lost, and division suggests the rifts that follow in families and communities. The ordinary word "afternoon" makes the dread feel close to everyday life.
The last stanza turns personal. The speaker prays that "some pain begin with me," which seems to mean the opposite of passing hurt along. Instead of pain spreading outward, the speaker wants to be the point where it starts and stops, absorbing it. The mood is sorrowful, hushed, and quietly hopeful.