My Father's Song

Simon J. Ortiz

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1976

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Symbols & Motifs

The Sand

The damp, sandy earth recurs throughout the poem as a symbol of nature’s fertility. Ortiz refers to it several times in almost every stanza, recalling “the soft damp sand” (Line 11), “the soft moist sand” (Line 17), the “sand moist clod” (Line 23), and the “cool and warm sand” (Line 25). These occurrences are usually at the end of each stanza, grounding his memory in the literal earth as he remembers the cool softness of the earth. His remark that he remembers the soft damp sand “this one particular time” (Line 10) infers that it is not always like this—soft, loamy, yielding earth that is easy to plow and plant. On this particular day, the boy is also receptive to growth and learning as he shadows his father in the fields. The mice have made a home in this forgiving landscape, finding shelter in the cool earth for their nest. Like the mice, the boy is also raised and nurtured in this field. His connection to the earth here is intentional in the poem. Just as they are planting seeds in the field, his father’s lesson will grow in him like a seed as well. Thus, the sand is not only a fertile space for corn to grow, and for small animals to thrive, but for the boy to learn and grow in the shelter of his father.

The Plowshare

The plowshare serves as a symbol in the poem, one that is mentioned only once but carries many implications. For one, the plowshare is not a piece of modern machinery. The farming tool dates back to Neolithic cultures, but it was not used by Native Americans until it was introduced to the Americas by Europeans. Plowing has been proven to be detrimental to soil quality, but at the same time it is less destructive than a tractor and seeder might be to the land, and it helps to feed humanity. Even with this simple tool, their farming practices have an impact on the land around them, which is here demonstrated in the disruption of an animal’s natural habitat. However, the use of such a simple tool, which brings the farmer closer to the ground itself, allows the father to spot the mouse’s babies and move them to safety. As such, the plowshare in the poem serves as a dual symbol—as a mechanical tool that threatens the ecosystem, but one that is nonetheless not so over-mechanized that it completely disconnects humanity from the earth they are plowing.

His Father’s Voice

The power of the father’s voice appears as a motif in the poem, opening and closing the poem in Stanzas 1 and 5. At the opening, Ortiz, now a grown man, misses his father, wishing he could speak to him again. This wish is to use his own voice, which is in a sense muted by the death of his father—he can no longer make that connection the way his father spoke with him as a child. Instead, the reader “hears” the father’s voice, which trembles with emotion, catches in his throat, and comes from the depth of his chest. Later this voice reappears in the last line of the poem as a vague recollection of the man “saying things” (Line 26) to his son. The reader knows that this is his father’s “song” (Line 7), and yet ironically, just as the author is muted by the loss of his father, we never hear the father’s voice. The reader does not know what the father tells his son; it is a memory kept private to the author. As such, the song of the father is “sung” in actions, as his father’s mercy for the mice shows what words cannot express.