I believe that this poem is actually about the abuse of a child (because
that’s just my personal point of view), but could have been intentionally written in
a way so that the reader could interpret it in an either/or way when it comes to
the subject matter. When I first read this poem in the 7th grade, I actually didn't
think it was about the little kid getting abused; I interpreted it as him and his
father playing around the house after dinner. But after the whole class shared
their interpretations, most of them thought it was about the boy being hit, and
that's when I realized that the poem actually did sound like it was about
something more negative and dark than just lightly playing around.
When I reread this poem again in the 8th grade, the image of a kid being
hit by his drunken father in the kitchen came to mind instead of playing around
and breaking things by accident, the way it did last year. And today I'm not sure
how I didn't see all this when I was in seventh grade. This is where I believe
rereading literature more than once in different perspectives and with more than
one idea in mind can add more sides to it and even help you understand the text
more and build onto your ideas on it. Not just in poetry, but in any kind of writing
it's best to not just think one-dimensionally about what you're reading, even if a
text may seem like it's simple and straightforward at first.
I do think that both points of view, being abused or playing, can work out in
interpreting the poem since I have thought in both points of view, and that the
author could possibly have written the poem in a way so that you can’t really be
sure if it means something light or something dark, which is a writing tool that I
think is very interesting and can make writing really great. If a piece of writing is
multi-dimensional and colorful instead of cliche and completely forward, then the
writing is certainly enhanced.
