My Papa's Waltz

The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not easy.

- This stanza is in the past tense, obviously the father's son reminiscing of his alcoholic father and probably what he said while he was drunk (aka his breath making him dizzy). The son perhaps wants to belief in his father and what he stands for but it's hard for him to stay on this path.

We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.

- Again in past tense, the boy might be reminiscing of his first sexual experiences. after reading the questions and analysis that was posed at the end of this story in the book I realized two odd word choices that Roethke made: "We romped UNTIL the pans slid from the kitchen shelf" and My mother's countenance could not UNFROWN ITSELF". It is as if he wants to change his sexual deficiency when he was younger, but the memories will not change for him, he still bothers his mother in his memories.

The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.

- The son again reminiscing of his father. It is possible to believe the father has beat his son with his hand and his belt buckle. Roethke shows the pain that the son remembers by expressing where the buckle was scraping him: the tender body part of his right ear. he also doesnt blame the buckle hitting him, merely that his father missed and that his knuckle was battered. it can be assumed that the son, while reminiscing of his father's beatings of him, has completely forgiven the acts of his father or believes that it was merely the nature of things in his past.

You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
still clinging to your shirt.

- Another reminscence of the son's father. His father possibly just came back from a long day's work. He most likely works at a job that requires a lot of physical labor, based on the dirt on his hands. He beats his son again, trying to teach him the lesson of time and how to use it. With the ammount of work he does, he is possibly teaching his son to make something for himself instead of ending up where he is today. the last two lines shows that the father gives the son rest, perhaps even forces rest upon him because of the term "waltezed", which seems to imply a leadership. "still clinging to your shirt" might imply that both in his memories and also now he clings to his father's lessons.