No one ever thanked him.

My second tone poem is Those Winter Sundays by Robert Hayden on page 850 of the Norton.

The description of the father getting up early on "Sundays too" (suggesting that he gets up early every other day as well), despite "the blueblack cold" and his "cracked hands that ached," give the poem and cold, lonely feeling. The fact that "no one ever thanked him" just adds to this, making it even worse because the man never feels appreciation for all his hard work.

When the father finally warms up the house, the speaker gets up "slowly," taking his time to get ready, feuled by the heat which his father created. This makes the reader feel unsympathetic towards the speaker, despite the "chronic angers of that house." He does not speak further of these angers, but one could speculate they could arise from the father's feelings of underappreciation, among other things.

In the third stanza, the tone starts to shift. The speaker still acts and speaks "indifferently to him," which follows along the same line. However, when the speaker mentions that his father "polished my good shoes as well," two conclusions come of that. It now appears that the speaker does not really understand the lengths at which his father goes to provide and care for him, which, as a child, happens. It also shows that the father does care for his child, doing that extra thing for him, and does not feel resentment for the lack of gratitude he receives. The last two lines are twinged with regret. The speaker laments the fact that he did not "know/of love's austere and lonely offices," everything that his father did for him and all the hard, solemn work he selflessly did for the love of his family.