My Papa’s Waltz - Battered Knuckles

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My Papa’s Waltz - Battered Knuckles

Many people look back on memories with a pleasant slant. A backpacker may love to go to the mountains, but every time that person ventures out he encounters a blizzard. The weather is not always conducive to the backpacker and can cause great discomfort. However, when the hiker returns to his normal routine he usually forgets about the bad experience so that he can continue loving the mountains and happily plan his next adventure. Similarly, Theodore Roethke's, "My Papa's Waltz" is a poem about a man who tries to make a horrible event into something much more pleasant to think about. The speaker seems to be remembering back to his childhood and finally uncovers dark memories about his father. The child in the poem finally realizes that childhood was full of scary nights in which he sometimes feared for his life. The speaker has tried for years to believe that he loved his father, but he finally understands what really happened in his boyhood home.

The speaker in this poem begins by commenting on how much his father drinks. The father ...

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