poetry essay

Submitted By hurtcha
Words: 511
Pages: 3

Top of Form
Those Winter Sundays”

Sometimes we look back to a certain time in our lives and think what if we knew what we know now, things could’ve been different. The main idea of the poem “Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden is as Joni Mitchell said “You don’t know what you’ve got till it is too late”. Specifically, the poem expresses the love the father shows even if he’s not “there” for his son. Also the father tries his best to give to his family but his son doesn’t appreciate it until later on in life. The Poem expresses this idea through imagery to show the love between the father and son and symbolism to show the father isn’t appreciated by his family. The Imagery is used to show the love between the father and son and their relationship. For example “Cracked hands”. This symbolizes the pain the father feels, even though he tries his best to support his family and he also feels broken because he doesn’t get any recognition for the some effort. Along with literally warming the house he even completed tasks like cleaning the boys shoes. For example “no one ever thanked him”. Another example for imagery would be “Sundays too my father got up early” which symbolizes that the boys’ father even got up on Sundays to go out and work hard to make money for the family in the harsh weather of the winter and shows the devotion he has towards his son. But on Sundays families usually spend time together whereas this little boy is fatherless because the father is never “there” for him. The father is physically present but emotionally he’s absent but still provides for the family. The symbolism is used in this poem to show how the father is really appreciated by the people he works really hard for to keep a roof over their heads. For example the author Robert