• kupitaḥ — angered
  The mahout's anger meets Kṛṣṇa's gravity. In Bhagavad-gītā 2.62–63, krodha is named as the doorway to ruin; the keeper walks through it the moment he chooses Kaṁsa's pleasure over Bhagavān's word.
• kāla-antaka-yama — time, death, and Yamarāja
  A triple superlative — the elephant is described as the very forces of cosmic destruction. The Gauḍīya reading: Bhagavān is also called kāla (Gītā 11.32), and so the meeting in this verse is between false kāla (Kuvalayāpīḍa) and real kāla (Kṛṣṇa). A contiguous-token join of synonyms 'kāla', 'antaka', and 'yama'.
• kṛṣṇāya — toward Kṛṣṇa
  Dative case — the elephant is launched 'for Kṛṣṇa', i.e. on His behalf in the līlā even as it appears to be against Him. Every demon in Canto 10 is ultimately offered to Kṛṣṇa; the asura is the one who does not know this.
• codayām āsa — he goaded
  Causative perfect — the keeper is not himself the attacker; he sets another being in motion. The whole verse exposes the chain of agency Kaṁsa → mahout → elephant, the standard structure of envy delegating its violence.

The mahout, threatened with Yamarāja, answers by sending an elephant who looks like Yamarāja himself. This is the demonic mirror — confronted with the Lord, asura-buddhi only doubles down. Where a devotee would have bowed, the keeper goads.