My Papa's Waltz by Theodore
Roethke
The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing is not easy.
We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.
The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.
You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt.
Level: Lower Sec
Themes: Family Relationships, Violence
Stylistic Devices: Euphemism, alternate rhyme
