Poetry Response #6 "Those Winter Sundays" BY ROBERT HAYDEN

Those Winter Sundays

BY ROBERT HAYDEN

Sundays too my father got up early

and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,

then with cracked hands that ached

from labor in the weekday weather made

banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

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,

who had driven out the cold

and polished my good shoes as well.

What did I know, what did I know

of love’s austere and lonely offices?

Response: 

Starting with a different route than usual, I think the theme of this poem could have something to do with appreciation; specifically, the appreciation for family members for all they do and all they do for us. In the first stanza, the speaker says no one ever thanked his father for all of his labor, “then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather made banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.” There is also imagery within that line because we can imagine the visual given or how the crack hands would appear as if they were in front of us, and we might also hear the sounds that cracked hands might make. Additionally, the aching hands show how much the father has worked but the final line of “No one ever thanked him” shows that he never received credit for all he did. There is an interesting shift from the first stanza to the second stanza, displaying a shift from the speaker’s father to the speaker’s environment, “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,” What’s with the paradoxes of heat and cold? The speaker can hear the cold but feel the warm rooms; in addition, the anger within the house can be another form of heat.

There is personification in the house being able to have a temper. I found it interesting of why the speaker decided to give the house that voice of anger. The third stanza shows the realization the speaker makes about his father, “Speaking indifferently to him, who had driven out the cold and polished my good shoes as well. What did I know, what did I know of love’s austere and lonely offices?”