My Papa

My Papa’s Waltz In “My Papa’s Waltz”, Roethke makes a point of how, as a child, he idolized his father despite his abuse and brutality. The title carries great irony because although it is affectionately named “My Papa’s Waltz”, immediately, from the first line, it portends the gravity of the poem. Roethke effectively utilizes verbs to communicate that sense of asperity provoked by the drunkenness of his father, for example ‘hung’, ‘romped’, ‘…showed first 75 words of 430 total…

…showed last 75 words of 430 total…powerful line “But I hung on like death”, death being a permanent state. This clearly indicates the child’s initial attachment to his father. The last line, where the child is “Still clinging to [his father’s] shirt” after all of the physical abuse imposed on him by his father, denotes the child’s strong desire to cling onto the heroic father he had idolized. In this way, both the child and father are pitied.