Apparently, "My Papa's Waltz" is easily ambiguous; it's hard to tell if its about a happy childhood memory or an abusive one. It could really be about both.
Considering some of Roethke's other poems, it seems that he writes about a lot of depressing things (hate, loneliness, death, etc.). With that in mind, the waltzing seemed to be a typical way the father and child interacted, something the kid enjoyed, but it doesn't mean it didn't ever go too far. The father didn't seem too concerned about scratches and scrapes the child received and mom might have just been frowning at the fact that the two men were messing up her clean kitchen. This is one thing that makes the poem confusing; she might have just frowned and not intervened because it would have opened her up receiving scrapes and scratches of her own. Other examples like whiskey, battered knuckles, hanging on like death, being held by a wrist, the waltzing not being easy, and beating can all contribute to the interpretation of the poem as an abusive father/child relationship.
However, maybe it was just about the love. Roethke's use of the word "romped" implies playfulness. As the father waltzed his child off to bed, the kid clung to his shirt. At one point, the child "hung on like death" to the father. The kid probably just enjoyed being with the father so much that he/she didn't want the romping to end. And maybe Roethke described the "waltz" as such a grim thing to illustrate how challenging it was for the child to keep up with the father's pace of romping. The child, in all likelihood, enjoyed the difficulty of the waltz. Otherwise, it would have been boring.
So, maybe the poem was about abuse or just plain fun. It can be confusing and go both ways.
I just flat out don't understand this poem at all.
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Sarah, I think you understand this poem quite well. Don't make the mistake of equating an understanding of a poem--this one or any other---with being able to paraphrase its meaning in a sentence or two or figure out what the poet is trying to say. Remember what we have been discussing in class: poems create meaning through sound, rhythm, image, metaphor, and the movement of lines just as much as they do so through theme and narrative. In some cases there is no narrative, and the theme is ambiguous if it exists at all. Poems, after all, aren't essays or moral tales or puzzles to be deciphered. They are often ambiguous, true, but that ambiguity can lead us to multiple readings, and each of those readings can be rewarding. Nice job with this one. I'd like to hear other people's responses as well.
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