My Papa's Waltz Poem Theme

Playing Rough Is Considered Abuse? Americans today tend to believe that “playing rough” is considered abuse. In discussion of the poem My Papa’s Waltz, by Theodore Roethke, one controversial issue has been that this piece of poetry is about a child being abused by his drunk father. On the other hand, part of the audience believes that the poem is about Theodore’s memory of his father and him dancing. While the subject of My Papa’s Waltz has spurred passionate academic debate from professors, scholars, and students alike, the imagery, syntax, and diction of the poem clearly support the interpretation that Theodore Roethke wrote My Papa’s Waltz to show how a “small boy” is being abused by his father using imagery, syntax, and diction. Roethke

Syntax is extremely important in this poem because there isn't much which makes the piece of poetry hard to understand. Throughout the whole poem Roethke uses a structure for his stanzas that make the poem truly formal and serious. He strictly uses only four lines for each stanza showing that he is neat with how he decides to place everything. Roethke also uses an awkward form of rhyme. In other words, in every rhyming pair he contradicts himself. For instance, line one “[t]he whiskey on your breathe” and line three “[b]ut I hung on like death are total opposite in meaning, making diction or word choice extremely important in the poem. Roethke has a different style in poetry and he follows all the rules for diction. All around the poem, Roethke only uses negative words to make the reader feel what the child is feeling and going through. For example, on line one, three, and five for My Papa's Waltz he uses words like “death,” “whiskey,” and “romped.” These words are truly negative by the feeling that we get when we come across them in the poem, that's why imagery, syntax, and diction are important in this poem because they all tie up to help us better understand My Papa's