In the third stanza, the child shows no emotion toward his father when he speaks to him. Now something new enters the scene. In the poem, an adult speaker reflects on how, when he was a child, his father would get up early on Sunday mornings throughout the winter in order to light a fire and warm up the house before anyone else got out of bed. The most important statement in this stanza comes from the speaker. Robert Hayden And A Summary of Those Winter Sundays. Then “what did I know of love’s austere and lonely offices” conveys mature realization of duties one performs willingly and in isolation for loved ones. The poem has an “If only…” tone; however, the anger in the house may have prevented the child from relating in a positive way to his father. Instead of saying the home or this house, he uses is “that house.” This phrase also emphasizes that the child and the present speaker divorce themselves from the house that holds all of this wrath, rage, or resentment. He is ashamed of having taken for granted the self-sacrificing duties routinely performed morning after morning by his hard-working and reticent parent. His father calls out to the child. Slowly, the child would dress dreading the “chronic angers of that house.” This phrase reflects the tone of the poem. Hayden studied poetry at the University of Michigan, and went on to teaching at both Michigan University and Fisk University. The child does not just dread the habitual rage, but rather fears it indicating that there may be violence involved or screaming. Over his years of teaching, Hayden continued to write and publish poetry, becoming one of the nation’s foremost African-American poets. The poet gives no more information, but the words that he chooses help the reader to understand the meanings. The first “What did I know” suggests a generalized lack of knowledge and understanding of the self-sacrifice of others – a deficiency made understandable though not excusable by the speaker’s youth and inexperience. It's only later on in life that the child becomes aware of the sacrifice his father, a hard working parent, made. Instead of saying the home or this house, he uses is “that house.” This phrase also emphasizes that the child and the present speaker divorce themselves from the house that holds all of this wrath, rage, or resentment. The word too indicates that the father gets up timely every day. The father beams the cooktops and firesides to warm the rooms for his family. The poet, in fact, assumes actions that have gone before—that the father got up early on other days as well as Sundays to help his family. The word chronic means long-lasting, continuing, enduring, and persistent. 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