Good Example Of Those Winter Sundays Essay

Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays” is a tribute to his foster-father. Hayden shares his memories of the father. This heart-rending poem is considered as his domestic masterpiece. It is a poem of definition and discovery. “Those Winter Sundays” is a fourteen-line free verse. Robert Hayden is the first African-American poet who gets Poet Laureate. This poem is not about identity or any other African-American themes. “Those Winter Sundays” is a simple poem, but has profound meaning. Hayden has attempted a brilliant try to regret his ingratitude for a sacrificing father. To personify the spirit of the poem, Hayden has built the poem in such a way to discover the synchronicity of sounds, define unspoken love, regret, and tell memories.
Love and regret are the foremost themes of the poem. As children do not know about the sacrifices made by their parents, Hayden failed to realize, and thank his father’s dedication to the welfare of his family that he admits wholeheartedly in this poem. In the first line, Hayden says, “Sundays too my father got up early” (Hayden, 1). The term “too” in the above line shows that his father had a practice of waking up very early in the morning daily without leaving Sundays too to keep his family warm. Now, the poet can understand the hard work of his father that makes him feel for not thanking him. He has thanked him through his poem “Those Winter Sundays.” However, he did not speak to his father affectionately who had driven out the cold from home and polished his shoes that he would wear to church. Instead, he had spoken indifferent to him. By telling about the shoe that he would wear to church, Hayden conveys his message of saying his father as a devoted puritan. He concludes his poem with a rhetorical question “What did I know” that shows his inexperience, lack of knowledge, and understanding of his father self-sacrifice. The next line proves his mature understanding of the sacrifices of the loved ones. His remembrance of his father is tardily appreciative and warm. Thus, Hayden presents his memories that start from his innocence to his mature realization.
“Those Winter Sundays” delineates unspoken love. The love of the father is not expressed in words, but through the care he did for his family “who had driven out the cold / and polished my good shoes as well” (Hayden, 11 – 12). His father cares his family by keeping his family away from cold weather even on Sundays and working hard during the weekdays. Even though, no one thanked him for his love and care for his family, he did his duties without failing. Hayden’s remorse and shame for lacking understanding and knowledge of his father’s sacrifices show in the concluding part of the poem, which did not fail to show his unspoken love for his father. Thus, the line “what did I know of love’s austere and lonely offices” expresses his matured understanding of sacrifice his father does volitionally. However, the love of both father and son is unspoken, but revealed through care and poem, respectively.
Even though this is a small poem, its words speak the every detail he has to convey. He has packed his words with deep meaning. Hayden uses symbols and images to make the readers feel the situation, which he recalls in his poem. Cold and warm that represent temperature are the symbols to represent the inner feeling of the poet. “Cracked hands” is a symbol that the poet effectively uses to symbolize hard work and pain of the father. Even the warm house is a symbol that reflects the father’s warm love that he showers on his family. “Cold, splintering breaking” are the wonderful images in which “splintering” helps the image by providing visual, audible, and tactile effects. By using the term “blueblack cold,” Hayden remembers his boyhood life in Detroit. Through the word “chronic angers,” he portrays the uncomfortable situation that spreads in the house. Above all, the term “austere” depicts not only the sacrifice of his father, but also the father figure himself. Even though it does not contain any rhyme scheme, Hayden uses synchronicity of sounds in the words such as “cracked,” “blueblack,” “thanked,” “banked,” “breaking,” weekday,” “breaking,” and “chronic.” He gives the coldness a role to personify the attitude of his family members. Hayden employs several figures of speech such as alliteration, anaphora, assonance, and metaphor. For example, he introduces metaphor to compare cold to a solid object that can break and splinter by saying “cold splintering, breaking.” However, alliteration occupies the dominant position among the other figures of speech in the words such as “blueblack,” “weekday weather,” and “banked fires blaze.” He uses images and simple words to link the relationship between a loving father and an inexperience son.
In his small poem “Those Winter Sunday,” Hayden has stuffed all his ideas, theme, style, and figures of speech that make the poem magnificent. Even though he has taken the love and regret as his main themes, he makes note of weather condition and the remembrance of his neighborhood. Thus, Hayden has built the poem in such a way to discover the synchronicity of sounds, define unspoken love, regret, and tell memories to gratify his father’s sacrifices. In his poem, Hayden presents the strength brevity, understatement, symbols, and imagery. His father did “banked fires blaze” to drive out the cold weather from his house and the flame does not catch out of fire, but out of his love. The matured poet realizes his ingratitude and ignorance of his father’s love and concern. It is a short poem containing 14 lines and 3 stanzas, but filled with profound meaning and deep, unspoken love. Hayden’s attempt try to regret his ingratitude for a sacrificing father is beautifully connected and made as a garland of words.