Paraphrase Entire Poem

1. Paraphrase Entire Poem, Stanza by Stanza:
I. The dad drank too much whiskey and his breath is making his son dizzy. The son is performing a drunken waltz with his dad.
II. Their waltz creates such a commotion in the kitchen that pans begin to fall off the shelf. The mother appears to be disapproving of the situation.
III. The father is grasping the son’s wrist. Every time the father misses a step, the boy’s ear scrapes along the father’s belt buckle, unacknowledged by the father.
IV. The father is keeping time (beating time) by tapping on the boy’s head with dirty hands. The waltz winds down and the father takes the boy to bed. However, the boy doesn’t want to sleep and continues to grasp on to his father’s shirt.
2. Persona, Characters,
The son is the speaker of the poem; he is a young boy who is no taller than his father’s belt line. It appears that the speaker is just a boy; his exact age is debatable. The boy may be young and speaking of the present, or he may be older and speaking of the past. Despite the age of the speaker at the time of the story, evidence suggests that this is a story of a young boy who lived in a broken home, constantly being maltreated by his father. The father is quite the whiskey fanatic; in the poem he is pictured to be dancing a drunken waltz with his son, with enough whiskey in his breath to make his son dizzy. One can infer that the relationship between the father and son is an abusive one, although some would disagree. When the father missteps, his belt buckle rubs amongst his son’s ear, but he carries on although he is hurting his son. His hands are caked with dirt and one of his knuckles is battered, which shows that he could be a hard worker. The mother plays a small role in the poem. The mom appears to be in disapproval of her husbands and son’s romp around the kitchen. Her face is in a frowning state, which could mean either her face usually appears sad or she is in disapproval. Although she seems to be upset with the waltz, on the inside she might actually have the desire to chuckle at her drunken husband. Since she doesn’t speak up some would say that she wasn’t’ upset; however,
Imagery and Tone: The use of imagery in this poem depicts its overall meaning and brings us into the boy’s memory of his childhood. In line one, Roethke appeals to the reader’s sense of smell in his description of the father’s breath, “The whiskey on your breath/Could Make a small boy dizzy.” He illustrates to the reader how much the father has been drinking as well as makes the reader imagine what the father’s breath smelled like. In line 9 ("The hand that held my wrist"), the boy brings us back to his childhood impression of his father’s hand. The line shows the father’s aggressiveness; rather than a kinder gesture of a hand holding a hand, his father is holding on to his boy’s wrist, which is a more dominating action. The hand holding the wrist could either be a measure of the different hand sizes between the boy and his father or show that the boy is being forced to dance with his father. In line 10 (“Battered on one knuckle”), Roethke is once again depicting the roughness of the father. Stating that his battered instead of wounded shows how his father could be aggressive. In lines 13-14 ("You beat time on my head/ With a palm caked hard by dirt"), Roethke displays the violent tendencies of the father by stating that he “beats time” on the boy’s head rather than the usual “keeps time.” Also, Roethke shows the roughness of the father when he states that the hand is “caked hard with