English (Core) · Ch 11 — Father to Son
Summary
Summary
- Poet: Elizabeth Jennings (1926-2001), an English poet known for her plain, honest and emotionally deep verse.
- Form: Four six-line stanzas, spoken throughout in the father's voice.
- Central idea: A father and his grown son have lived together for years yet have become strangers; the poem explores their emotional distance, the father's guilt and helplessness, and a shared longing for reconciliation.
- Movement of the poem: The father admits he does not understand his son, questions his own part in the estrangement, wishes the son would return like the prodigal, and ends with both reaching out 'empty hands.'
- Key themes: the generation gap, the failure of communication, guilt and helplessness, and the yearning to forgive and be forgiven.
- Devices: simile ('speak like strangers'), the seed/land metaphor, the Biblical 'prodigal' allusion, the 'empty hand' symbol, enjambment, and the paradox 'anger grows from grief.' …