This description gives the visual of a very robust and strong, idol for the poet as a child. .
The poem makes it sound like this dance is a frequent happening and a happy experience for the child who wants to hang on to his father even though the procedure of the waltz is rather rough on him, and it is hard for him to keep up. The poem has a sort of humorous tone to it. The waltz with his father was so vigorous that the "pans / Slid from the kitchen shelf" (My Papa's lines 5-6), thoroughly annoying the mother who's "countenance / Could not unfrown itself" (My Papa's lines 7-8). She does not like to see her kitchen fall apart because her husband and child are bouncing around the house. .
This poem creates nostalgia, for me of when I used to dance around the house with my father. The thing that is unsettling about this poem though is the word choice. There are many words like "Death", "Battered", "Scraped", and "Beat". I know that these words have led many critics of this poem to believe that the child in the story isn't really dancing with his father, but rather being beaten by him. Even if this was so, it only strengthens the meaning of the child's continuing love for his father. He hangs on. He doesn't run away from his father, he doesn't desert him. If anything his love is stronger. .
In "I Knew a Woman" he focuses on a single woman, as is obvious from the title. This is a woman that he puts on a pedestal, but his description makes this seemingly grand praise have an underlying sexual connotation. To make this description obvious, he uses alliteration and perfect word choice. Each of these two devices contributes to the overall image of, and emotions about this woman that Roethke knew.
One way he accentuates his feelings about this woman is the repetition of the letter "s" in the front and middle of words throughout the poem, often in key places. When a string of "s" sounds are put together, there is a smoothness formed in the reader's mind.
