"Those Winter Sundays" by Robert Hayden and "Forgiving My Father" by Lucille Clifton both illustrate speakers who are letting go of resentment toward their father. "Those Winter Sundays" is a poem about a person reminiscing over his father's actions and the family's coldness toward him. "Forgiving My Father" is also about a person reflecting on her past relationship with her father, she is not content with the past and wants to put it behind her. The two poems have parallel topics and share similarities but are also extremely different. Contrast in their tones and underlying messages, and the use of symbolism separate the poems but reveal the purpose for each speakers' monologue.

Writers have a reason for writing everything, it could be because of either an interest due to unfamiliar territory they have yet to experience or because they have a very real, very deep connection with the topic and want their audience to understand those parts of their lives better; either way the author's past vastly shapes the works they create. Robert Hayden and Lucille Clifton have similar backgrounds but experienced vastly different home lives in which they used to create poems that resemble each other. Research

Though the two poems show speakers who feel negatively toward their father, the tone at which they describe their discrepancies vary. Hayden creates a tone in "Those Winter Sundays" that shows the speaker having a sort of confusing realization about his childhood. The use of past tense verbs convey that these events are memories the speaker is reflecting on, which at first seems to be a regretful message but with further context and analysis it can be seen as a discovery that the speaker is not very fond of. He talks about a memory of his father warming the house early on Sunday mornings and then follows it with the phrase "No one ever thanked him" (5). Sundays are a symbolic day of rest, which indicates that even on his day off the speaker's father would make sure the family was comfortable but was never acknowledged for this, what appears to be, caring act. He also mentions later on that his father would polish his "good shoes" (12); another action that could be seen as a caring service the father should have received gratitude for but according to the speaker did not. The text in between these two pieces of information is what changes the tone of the poem. The speaker describes himself in the memory as well as his perception of the memory. He says:

I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.

When the rooms were warm, he'd call,

and slowly I would rise and dress,

fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him, (6-10)

"Chronic angers of that house" (9) specifically stands out. He is adamant to mention the noises of the house but the entire rest of the poem is clearly about his father's actions. The house and its "chronic angers" (9) is a symbol for the father. As his father called he rose slowly as if to be very cautious and not to disturb anything. He didn't fear the house, he feared his father's short temper and spoke to him indifferently as to not upset him in any way. The memory is all past tense and indirect toward the father because at the time he didn't know any better, he didn't understand that it wasn't normal to have to be so cautious as a child but he now realizes it in the present and shows resentment because of it. The last two lines "What did I know, what did I know / of love's austere and lonely offices?" (13-14) reinforce this. He didn't know how his father acted was wrong, he didn't know what love was supposed to look like and at that moment it was lonely and confined. The past tense "did" in "What did I know" (13) implies that he now does know what love looks like and the difference in how he used to view it. This realization is what brings to surface a resentment toward his father. 

"Forgiving My Father" seems to be very similar to "Those Winter Sundays" in a sense that Clifton produced a monologue in which the speaker is addressing her father in a negative tone. The tone when examined more closely, however, is vastly different from the speaker's in Hayden's poem. Instead of the speaker coming to a conclusion, she addresses her weariness of her past relationship with her father in a harsh way as to indicate she is finally moving past it. The title is the first signal of this present tense action of her moving forward, specifically because of the word "forgiving" which itself is a present tense verb. Throughout the entire poem the reader reiterates her disgust with her father. She refers to him as an "old lecher" and an "old liar", says he is "the only son of a needy father" and that he had "nothing" and would "come up empty any Friday." All of these descriptions reveal that her father was a poor, perverted, probably lazy man who provided nothing to his family and this left the speaker with childhood memories she is not fond of and of which haunted her. In the final lines she asks the question "what am i doing here collecting?" The whole poem is the speaker addressing her father but in these lines she could also be asking herself this question as well. She doesn't want to be burdened by the past anymore; her parents are both dead, not able to do any more damage to her life and she is finally accepting and moving past it. 

Symbolism is an important part of each of these poems and helps to explain their purpose. . .

