treasures

Those Winter Sundays- 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?

An experience that most have had: the parent sacrificing for the child. Yet Hayden does not simply dismiss this occurrence as a common part of daily life. Instead he delves into the experience to pull out a revelation so often overlooked in such a mundane scene. Hayden uses the poem “Those Winter Sundays” to emphasize the extent to which humans can sacrifice for a treasure while at the same time bringing to light a human tendency to overlook the treasures we possess until they are no longer in our possession.

The very first line of the poem opens with hardship: “Sundays too my father got up early.” The fact that the speaker emphasizes “too,” clarifying that his father was subject to the same fate on a regular basis, suggests a life of hard work and little rest, possibly physically as well as mentally. It also creates an atmosphere of repetition, as if the father has no escape for this daily toil. This is highlighted by the fact that even on a Sunday, a day typically reserved for rest, the father still adheres to his normal schedule of work. The father’s emotions are hinted at by the “blueblack cold” in which he dresses, mixing together the blue of sadness as well as the black of the unknown, as if the father himself has lost sight of his goal. The “cold” around him illustrates the fact that there is no one providing body heat around him, bringing up the loneliness of the old man. However, that very man is the one that made “fires blaze,” symbolizing the companionship he provides for the speaker despite his loneliness.

The speaker, on the other hand, did not endure nearly as much suffering as his father, dressing himself in rooms that were “warm” due to his father’s work as opposed to the cold that his father was forced to change in. Despite this, it is the speaker “fearing” of what could happen to him, displaying a very self-centered view which emphasizes all the more the lack of consideration the speaker has for his father. This is made even clearer in the speaker’s tone toward his father, as he speaks “indifferently,” indicating ignorance as to the extent of suffering that his father has gone through for him.

This lack of appreciation is made all the more hurtful when considering the fact that the father has not just suffered through cold to warm the speaker, but he has sacrificed his life in order to help the speaker achieve a higher position in life. The father has worked so much for the speaker that his hands have already become “cracked” from diligence. He was willing to protect the speaker from the “angers of that house” which may not only be the physical building around them but the society around them that the speaker cannot deal with himself, leaving it to his father instead. The speaker’s father even “polished [his] good shoes,” suggesting that the speaker must soon go on a journey, possibly the journey of life, that the father has prepared him for. Unfortunately, the father’s efforts are met with ungrateful words, displaying the child’s tendency to overlook the essential part played by parents, causing them to look down on the parents instead of treasuring their contributions.

However, the speaker makes his regret very clear. “What did I know,” he laments of his ignorance. Throughout the poem this feeling of regret is emphasized through the contrast between the speaker preoccupation with self and the speaker’s acknowledgement of his father’s sacrifices. However, the past tense used throughout the poem makes it clear that the regret that the speaker feels cannot be changed because his mistakes were in the past where he clearly no longer has influence. The acknowledgment of his mistake as well as his inability to correct it emphasizes Hayden’s message that what we should treasure we often do not until it is too late.