Here is Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays.” It’s not primarily about any religious holiday, but consists of nicely understated praise for a father along with a confession of regret. We see modest lives, along with childish self-absorption and the need to repent that later on. The honoring of the father is grounded in no holiday fairy tale, but in reality, including the mysterious and perhaps under-explained “chronic angers of that house.”
I had to choose between winter and Father’s Day as the right time for this poem. With all the holiday hullaballoo and fru-fru out there, I chose now.
I have at least two more father poems in mind, one complimentary, one or two others, not so much. Stay tuned.
Those Winter Sundays by Robert E. Hayden : The Poetry Foundation [poem] : Find Poems and Poets. Discover Poetry.
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2 comments:
Ouch.
It hurts just to read it. I feel the child's indifference. Ouch.
As a child I was taught that the opposite of LOVE isn't HATE. The opposite of LOVE is INDIFFERENCE.
Ouch, I still say. I hope the kid grew up and hugged his dad someday, tho I worry about the chronic anger in the house...
Brenda, I bet Hayden would find that a great response. I don't know his bio or his work thoroughly, but I have the impression he received plenty of indifference as a poet.
I hear the speaker as an adult looking back on it, so maybe your hope for the kid has panned out.
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