“The Portrait” by Stanley Kunitz

The poet is speaking about the presence of his father and how that molded his entire
life. He never knew him because he committed suicide before he was born;however
his entire life, he felt the absence of his father through all the emotions his mother
carried around with her. He recalls an incident when he carried a portrait of his father
down from the attic and his mother grabbed it from him and tore it to shreds. He is 64
when he wrote the poem and still feels pain about his father.

This poem is a tribute to the reality that the unlived life or unexpressed
emotions(anger) of a parent can be passed onto his or her child, unknowingly. It is as
if the "sins of the father" are visited on his son. His father killed himself; but he also
killed his son.

In this poem by Kunitz, Kunitz creates a piece that rather than following traditional
rules of poems rather gives a piece similar to that of an anecdote.
In lines one through 4, the 64 year old narrator remembers the grudge in which their
mother holds against their father for killing himself in a public park. The grudge
seems to be about the embarrassment of the whole situation as it is backed with,
“especially at such an awkward time and in a public park.” I also, believe the
awkward time that is being referred to is the birth of the narrator. As stated, “that
spring when I was waiting to be born.”
In the following lines of text the narrator tells about his mother trying to forget the
whole situation, "she locked him in her deepest cabinet and would not let him out,
though I could hear him thumping." So, rather than facing his death she turns away
and pretends he never even existed in her life and keeps him out of her child’s life as
well. The reasoning of her hiding him and trying to forget circles back to the
embarrassment as the poem goes on, and the narrator brings the mother a portrait of
the father down from the attic and the mother promptly tears it to shreds and slaps the
narrator. However, the narrator does not view the father in the same way as the mother
as the narrator describes the father as having features of “a brave moustache and deep
brown level eyes.” The narrator uses the words brave and level to express this as these
are approachable and even heroic features. This context makes the poem appear to
have a tone of sorrow and even confusion.
And in the final lines the narrator gives the imagery, “I can feel my cheek still
burning,” and this shows the shock that was given to the narrator and even supports a
theory that the reason for the father’s suicide is the narrator. The evidence of this is
coincidental timing of the father’s suicide (right before the birth of the narrator that
spring). The father may have not wanted to have a child, resulting directly in him
committing suicide. The mother might also have known the reasoning as she actually
goes as far as to slap the narrator as if he is in the need of punishment for her anger.

This poem gives the central theme that emotional pain can last a lifetime as the
mother years later still held a grudge and could never forgive the father. Also, the
narrator being slapped is not feeling physical pain but rather an emotional pain of
shock from the mother’s reaction.