My Papa's Waltz

Karissa TenEyck

Mr. Chuck Baker

English102-W60

April 13, 2016

“My Papa’s Waltz”

        Theodore Roethke’s poem “My Papa’s Waltz” is narrated by the young male whom it is written about, as he reflects a past childhood evening with his parents. The theme of this poem was purposely left open for assumptions by the reader with the use of the author’s choice of words, explicit words that have contradictive meaning that can express intense emotions.

        In the first stanza the boy remembers the smell of whiskey as if it was a common occurrence on his Papa’s breath.  As the boy recalls his time bonding with his father was exciting. He says “Such waltzing was not easy.” and the vision of the boy clinging to his father for dear life could almost portray his pride of how well he hung on (line4). It was an astonishing recreational dance between the boy and his Papa.  While reading the poem the reader can detect the love the boy has for his father as he calls him Papa which is an endearing name for “Dad” or “Father” and yet his mother was only called “Mother.” The mother on the other hand is the silent witness to the frolicking between father and son. Although she wasn’t smiling on the outside, her emotions on the inside could have been overwhelmed with happiness.

        The third stanza presents the fundamental thought of violence or abuse represented by Papa’s belt buckle scraping the child’s ear. The act of the son scraping his ear is placed as a visual for the thought that the belt buckle could help the reader assume punishment is abroad later on. The buckle was mentioned to give the negative tone but also to simply help the reader envision the approximate height of the boy. The intentional use of the words such as “beat” attempts to make the reader see red with anger. Why would Papa beat on his child’s head while waltzing with him? Theodore Roethke’s use of severe words tries to make the reader believe that there might be some type of abuse going on in this family. While the simile “But I hung on like death” does not reflect the actual act of dying but rather the child was merely clinging on to his dad for dear life as the waltz is a quick moving dance and taking in to consideration, his Papa was drunk the dance was faster than normal with missed steps and with not the smoothest transitions. (line3).

        The underlying theme is that of the hard working father enjoys some one-on-one time with his son as well as participating in the boy’s bedtime rituals. It sounds as though Papa tried to make it enjoyable for the boy and succeeded at it. The only true distance was made obvious in the poem was with the word choice “The hand that held my wrist: /” in which Papa wasn’t given an identity and in turn gave the reader the allusion abuse (line 9). Undeniably Papa was a hard worker and demonstrates his love and devotedness to his family.  Between the two, the reader can tell that they danced quite often for a young boy to know the steps and also for the boy to know when steps were missed. Waltzing was not something new to him. “We romped until the pans slid from the kitchen shelf:” (line 5-6). This was a deliberate choice of words that the author used to introduce negativity into the readers’ minds. According to John. J McKenna’s research article “Roethke’s Revisions and the Tone of my Papa’s Waltz” this was ultimately Roethke’s intentions, “to balance the negative and positive tones of the poem” (McKenna, 35).