Papa’s Waltz is a love hate poem toward the authors parents. This poem was a way for the boy to get his anger out. Behind the darkness of the poem lies the loving side of the boy dedicating this to his parents. Showing them that even though all these things that happened he will still love him until the day he dies. Which is the overall message of this poem loving someone and accepting everything about them even if they have hurt you. When I first read this poem, it struck me to the heart because I can relate to the many situations it brings up. From the first time reading it through I interpreted this poem as a child waiting at home for his grandpa to come home drunk again. When the grandpa came home the family knew he had been drinking the author describes the amount of Whiskey as enough to make a small boy dizzy. But, the family knew that grandpa knew no better so they hung on and just did grandpas dance with no real concern until …show more content…
A example of this is in stanza three line one and two “The hand that held my wrist was battered on one knuckle” this quote helps us as the reader visualize how violent things got. Another literary device used is a metaphor there is only one example of this and it is found in stanza one line three “But I hung on like death” he is comparing how he holds on to death because even thought his father beat him he will love him to the end of time. There is also a lot of symbolism in this poem for example “For every step you missed my ear scraped the buckle” when I read this I thought it was talking about how when the mom missed a hit the boy had to take It. I was wrong after sever times of analyzing it, when the author says this he means that when his father failed or did not get something right it was the boy fault and he would get beat up. This poem was a way for the author so get his bitterness out at his dad, anger toward his mm out while also showing love to