What are your impressions of the boy and the children?

My impression of the boy is that he is a very pessimistic person, often looking at the sad side of things and never trying to remedy his predicament. He also was never accepted by his peers. The fact that he returns to the playground everyday despite being rejected all the time possibly shows that he likes to watch them play, is envious of them and wants to join in. He stays to the wall possibly because it was a physical and emotional support for him. That further proves that "The Loner" was an emotionally weak person, preferring to cave in against anyone who wants to hurt him. "His loneness is his shell and shield, and neither he nor we will yield" tells us that neither "The Loner" nor the children in the playground would take the initiative to talk to one another. We can infer from the sentences "We pass him running, skipping, walking, in slow huddled groups, low talking, each in our familiar clique" that the children has a sense of security in each of their social circles and would not cross over and invite "The Loner" to join them. Not only that, they gossip and possibly bad-mouth "The Loner" while walking pass him. The poor boy in the end moved away without even trying to strike up a conversation with the children, thus, I reckon that "The Loner" is a person that never tries to remedy his predicament and is very pessimistic.

In my opinion, the children in the playground were insecure and very mean to "The Loner", and also very stubborn. For instance, whenever they passed by the boy, they would talk in low voices. That obviously shows that they do not want the boy to hear what they were talking about, and they were most probably talking about something mean about the boy. They played hard, and the sentences "The playground’s quick with life, the beat is strong" shows that the children were playing and laughing, shouting and skipping all at the same time. "Though sharp as a knife, strife does not last long" tells us that "strife', which probably means their quarrels or fights would dissipate quickly, and they would reconcile almost immediately. "And neither he nor we will yield" shows that the children were very stubborn people, thinking that if the boy doesn't budge, they would not either. They never dared to step out of their comfort zone to talk to the boy, because of the fear that if they made contact with a reject, they would be a reject themselves. That makes that very insecure, preferring to stay within their social circle, their comfort zone, and because of that, I think that these children are very insecure.