Read this poem, and then answer the question that follows it:
The City Planners
Cruising these residential Sunday
streets in dry August sunlight:
what offends us is
the sanities:
the houses in pedantic rows, the planted
sanitary trees, assert
levelness of surface like a rebuke
to the dent in our car door.
No shouting here, or
shatter of glass; nothing more abrupt
than the rational whine of a power mower
cutting a straight swath in the discouraged grass.
But though the driveways neatly
sidestep hysteria
by being even, the roofs all display
the same slant of avoidance to the hot sky,
certain things:
the smell of spilt oil a faint
sickness lingering in the garages,
a splash of paint on brick surprising as a bruise,
a plastic hose poised in a vicious
coil; even the too-fixed stare of the wide windows
give momentary access to
the landscape behind or under
the future cracks in the plaster
when the houses, capsized, will slide
obliquely into the clay seas, gradual as glaciers
that right now nobody notices.
That is where the City Planners
with the insane faces of political conspirators
are scattered over unsurveyed
territories, concealed from each other,
each in his own private blizzard;
guessing directions, they sketch
transitory lines rigid as wooden borders
on a wall in the white vanishing air
tracing the panic of suburb
order in a bland madness of snows.

Explore how Atwood makes this poem so disturbing.

Margaret Atwood makes “The City Planners” a disturbing poem through various literary techniques and themes that highlight the negative aspects of suburban life and critique the uniformity and conformity of modern urban planning.

Subversion of Expectations: Atwood begins the poem by describing a seemingly peaceful suburban scene with no shouting, shattering of glass, or abrupt disruptions. However, as the poem progresses, she reveals the darker aspects lurking beneath the surface, such as the smell of spilt oil, a splash of paint on brick, and a plastic hose poised in a vicious coil. This subversion of the expected idyllic suburban image creates a sense of unease and discomfort.