My Papa's Waltz Theme

In “My Papa’s Waltz”, Theodore Roethke portrays a father-son relationship that proves to be often brutal. The author uses enjambment within the poem to show the negative effects after actions; along with the metaphors describing the father and the beatings. For example, the boy would feel how “his right ear scraped a buckle” to the failures “at every step ‘you’ missed”. However, deep down in his heart, the boy loves his father. He describes him as a poor man whose “hand...was battered on one knuckle”. The hand was also “caked hard by dirt”, showing how he was hardworking enough to deserve pity.