Memrie Laney
Mrs. Beddingfield
English 1123
28 February 2016
Poetry Explication on My Papa’s Waltz Theodore Roethke portrays a deteriorated family in “My Papa’s Waltz.” At the beginning of the story Roethke shows a merry way to end the evening which then turns into a grim experience. The poem, written in iambic trimeter, shows a little boy who is dancing with his tipsy father. The first time I read this poem I thought of a happy child dancing with his father, but by the end of the composition my point of view on the story changes. This poem uses diction, symbolism, and structure to display the sovereignty that a father has over a child. My Papa’s Waltz shows a fun waltz, but with more meanings to it than just that. The author uses specific diction in this poem to focus on the prime idea that the relationship between the father and son is neither a happy nor a healthy one. The poem seems like a young boy enjoying the company of his father. The boy claims to “hang on” to his father while they danced, implying that he loved his father and acknowledged the quality time. However, he would hold on to his father “like death,” as he states in line two, which changes the tone of the poem from something happy to something scary. Roethke uses words such as “beat” and “battered” in lines ten and thirteen respectively. The father can keep time just …show more content…
This is written in iambic trimeter. The poem has an uncomplicated ABAB rhyme scheme. This poem uses words that almost rhyme, but not exactly. For example, a sentence from the first line of the passage states, “The whiskey on your breath/could make a small boy dizzy;/But I hung on like death:/Such waltzing was not easy.” The word “dizzy” sounds like “easy,” but the words are not perfect rhymes. This poem has three stressed syllables per line. What stuck out the most is that a waltz also has three beats. Therefore, this poem is written as a waltz
Mrs. Beddingfield
English 1123
28 February 2016
Poetry Explication on My Papa’s Waltz Theodore Roethke portrays a deteriorated family in “My Papa’s Waltz.” At the beginning of the story Roethke shows a merry way to end the evening which then turns into a grim experience. The poem, written in iambic trimeter, shows a little boy who is dancing with his tipsy father. The first time I read this poem I thought of a happy child dancing with his father, but by the end of the composition my point of view on the story changes. This poem uses diction, symbolism, and structure to display the sovereignty that a father has over a child. My Papa’s Waltz shows a fun waltz, but with more meanings to it than just that. The author uses specific diction in this poem to focus on the prime idea that the relationship between the father and son is neither a happy nor a healthy one. The poem seems like a young boy enjoying the company of his father. The boy claims to “hang on” to his father while they danced, implying that he loved his father and acknowledged the quality time. However, he would hold on to his father “like death,” as he states in line two, which changes the tone of the poem from something happy to something scary. Roethke uses words such as “beat” and “battered” in lines ten and thirteen respectively. The father can keep time just …show more content…
This is written in iambic trimeter. The poem has an uncomplicated ABAB rhyme scheme. This poem uses words that almost rhyme, but not exactly. For example, a sentence from the first line of the passage states, “The whiskey on your breath/could make a small boy dizzy;/But I hung on like death:/Such waltzing was not easy.” The word “dizzy” sounds like “easy,” but the words are not perfect rhymes. This poem has three stressed syllables per line. What stuck out the most is that a waltz also has three beats. Therefore, this poem is written as a waltz