Thursday, October 31, 2013

A poem about fathers, sons, and expecatations: "Like Him" by Aaron Smith

I subscribe to The Academy of American Poets' Poets.org "poem-a-day," and today's poem really grabbed me.  I'm not a boy, but the speaker's feelings about his father and his expectations made me think a lot about my own parents and my kids.  

Poet Aaron Smith had this to say about his poem: "I thought I would be less interested in writing from the perspective of a son about his parents as I approached forty.  I'm finding that's all I seem to think about.  This older speaker seems more aware of (and more willing to talk about) the tricky spaces that exist between father and sons.  It's also a poem about the expectations of men in culture and what failing to live up to those mean."

The shift in the last few lines of the poem...read it and see if your feelings about the speaker change like mine did.  Who's the "good guy" and who's the "bad guy?"  Is there one?

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