Comparing 'My Papa's Waltz And Schizophrenia'

Through different elements of poetic literature the poets and their poems succeed to communicate their themes of love and family relationships. Poems were meant to express feelings of anger, love, money, or work management. Although some are written in different forms whether it is a sonnet or a haiku. Either way the poets used different techniques and word forms to get their selected theme across to the readers. The first theme that can be deciphered from poets is: family relationships. Two poems that exhibit this theme are: My Papa’s Waltz by Theodore Roethke and Schizophrenia by Jim Stevens. Both poems are similar yet different depending on the reader’s perspective. The second theme that can be deciphered from poets is: love. Two poems

that exhibit this are: French Toast by Anya Krugovoy Silver and Linguini by Diane Lockward. Both poems consist of elements of word choice, which helps contribute to the poem’s success of communicating the theme.

They both also have a specific structure to how they were written.
After analyzing both poems, it is clear that Schizophrenia exhibits the form of a free verse meanwhile My Papa’s Waltz is a fixed form. Steven’s poem is a free verse because the speaker of the poem could be the poet or someone who experienced it. This is indicated by how he speaks.The shift occurs between the last two stanza's. It is obvious because this is when Stevens’ refers back to the beginning. Roethke’s poem is a fixed form because it follows a simple ABAB rhyme scheme.where every other line rhythms. It also follows the same number of lines within the stanzas. The poems exert the feelings and emotions through each word and line. The poets use this technique to emphasize the theme of the poem. Both poems prove the theme to be about family relationships. In Schizophrenia, the poem starts off saying “It was the house that suffered the most”(line 1). This already gives the reader insight that the house went through and felt what the family on the inside was going through. This element of personification makes it seem like the house was a person and it was suffering from the pain and abuse the family put it

through. “It had begun with slamming doors/ angry feet scuffing the carpets, dishes slammed onto the table”(lines 2-3), these lines show anger and force as the family that lived in the home were always filled with anger. As readers know when one is angry they get an adrenaline rush and use a great deal of force “in the heat of the moment.” This is similar to that of the poem: My Papa’s Waltz”. In this poem we see that the narration is coming from a young boy speaking of his relationship with his father. Signs of abuse are evident throughout this poem. Lines 9 through 16 which state “The hand that held my wrist/Was battered on one knuckle/At every step you missed/My right ear scraped a buckle/You beat time on my head/With a palm caked hard by dirt/Then waltzed me off to bed/Still clinging to your shirt.” These lines show that the father possibly beat his son in a drunken manner. We know that he is drunk because the first two lines that the poem opens up with are “The whiskey on your breath/ could make a small boy dizzy”. The father is so under the influence of alcohol that he can’t properly appreciate his son nor can he control himself.
Although abuse and violence are sub topics of the theme of family relationships communicated through Stevens’ poem: Schizophrenia, it is not the only topic that is interpreted from My Papa’s Waltz however. In Schizophrenia, we see windows are broken, voices are shouting, crying is occurring and neighbors declared that house as a “madhouse”, all of these factors play along in the topics of abuse and violence. In Roethke’s poem, we can switch from the thoughts of abuse under intoxication to playful banter. The second stanza “We romped until the pans/slid from the kitchen shelf/my mother's countenance/could not unfrown itself” proves that the father-son rough play dancing got out of hand and created a mess to the point where the mother scowled at both of them for not being careful in the house. Therefore My Papa’s Waltz can be about an alcoholic, abusive father, or it's an innocent, loving memory. Both poems differentiate in the elements of literature used, whether it is personification, simile, metaphor, or using the five senses to create imagery.
In Schizophrenia, Jim Stevens creates such a vivid image in the readers mind of what this house sounds, looks, smells and even feels like. The author uses personification to create layers of meaning. One example is when the author makes it seem as if the house has feelings and suffers hurt. The author uses the sound device alliteration. An example of alliteration is when he uses the words stains spreading together. The house was a symbol that when their relationship fell apart, so did the house. In My Papa’s Waltz, the tone of violence due to the abuse of alcohol from the father. We get a sense of smell through this poem with strong scent of whiskey on the fathers breath.