
When we think of waltz, we imagine a lovely couple dancing around and around to the lilting music. They share each other’s feeling by looking into their eyes. Happiness, joy, love, and affection are absolutely part of waltz. Ironically, in the poem “My Papa’s Waltz,” those positive notions of waltz are depicted as violent and even abusive images. However, if we interpret the poem in depth, we can see an adult speaker struggling to come to terms with a childhood memory that reveals the father’s clumsiness at expressing his love for his son, and that the waltz is a way to build their love and relationship through the imagery and diction in this poem.

The poem “My Papa’s Waltz,” written by Theodore Roethke, portrays a little boy and his father waltzing together. The father is heavily drunk from the whiskey, and the little boy feels dizzy from his father’s breath. From this description, we easily misinterpret that the son is against his will and forced to waltz with his drunken father. However, the truth is that the son neither resists waltzing nor hates his father for being drunk because he strives to waltz as best as he can as he, “hung on like death” (3) to his father. Of course, as the poem reads, “such waltzing was not easy” (4). This phrase does not simply tell waltzing was not easy because the father is drunk, but functions as the illustration of the poor relationship between the father and his son. “Such waltzing was not easy” because the father waltzes with his son only when he is drunk; he rarely spends time to play with his son on a daily basis. He might be physically not the kindest nor the friendliest father to his son. However, he is merely unfamiliar with those kind and loving expressions, and he truly knows, in his mind, that he loves his son the most in the world. That is why the father gets intoxicated, so that his usual clumsiness at expressing love to his son becomes easier for him. The son also loves his father very much and knows that waltzing is the only time that he can spend with his father, so he does his best to endure the smell of the alcohol. 

The father and his son waltzed and “romped until the pans / Slid from the kitchen shelf” (5-6). The phrase “we romped” implies that both the father and his son enjoy waltzing together and are happy about their waltz. If the theme of this poem is actually a child abuse, then the speaker might have chosen different phrase. Connecting with the interpretation above, their waltz is obviously inelegant as they are messing up the kitchen. The mother’s “countenance / Could not unfrown itself” (7-8) from watching them waltzing. This does not portray that she is angry about the situation, but rather demonstrates that she is unwillingly watching two mischievous “boys” dancing and causing such troubles in the house. Furthermore, she knows that waltzing is their only time to be close together, so she does not interrupt them. Her action supports the claim that the relationship between the father and his son is poor. She allows them to dance however they want because she does not want to ruin their occasional bonding time. Her face is frowned only because she is worried about her son to get hurt physically and emotionally. 

From the following stanza, we can observe that how the father and his son are sacrificing themselves to express their love of each other from the clumsy waltz:

The hand that held my wrist

Was battered on one knuckle;

At every step you missed

My right ear scraped a buckle.

Since the father is waltzing when he is not fully sober, he lacks to manage himself to lead his son carefully. As the father grabs his son’s wrist instead, the father’s hand is battered by his son’s knuckle, but the father does not say a word about it. The son is short compared to his father, so his ears get scraped by a buckle on his father’s jacket during waltz, but just like the father, the son does not say a word about it. These dictions appeal to the sense of feeling and may seem violent. However, for the father and his son, the pains of waltzing are worth more than having a poor relationship. They are sharing their feelings, but just in a different way because waltz is their only time to communicate and express their love.

When the father beats time on his son’s head, the son notices that his father’s palm is “caked hard by dirt” (14). His dirty hands imply that the occupation of the father requires long and hard physical labor. The father’s clumsiness at expressing his love to his son is not the only obstacle in the relationship. His job is another barrier because the father does not have enough time to play with his son. The father is upset by this situation because his job that provides the living of the family causes an awkward relationship between the father and his son. Therefore, he drinks whiskey to ease up his emotional pains, then comes home to waltz with his son. The son also realizes this and always longs to waltz with his father because the waltz is more important than the smell of the alcohol. This is why even though the father waltzes his son off to bed, his son is “still clinging to your [the father’s] shirt” (16). The son wants to maximize the limited time he has with his father. In addition, the son feels compassion for the image of both his drunken father and his father’s coarse hands.

By analyzing this poem in depth, the theme in “My Papa’s Waltz” depicts negative images of a positive relationship between the father and his son. Its detailed descriptions arouse the readers to sympathize with the son’s feelings and take a journey into the readers’ own childhood memories with their fathers. Fathers can be clumsy with expressing their loves to their beloved children. However, as this poem conveys, the true love does not depend on how well we express our love to one another. Our ways of expressions are just different: the depth of our own love is deeper than of anybody else’s.
