Generally, readers believe the tone to be playful or resentful, although the poem consists of many more facets of tone. In the poem's opening ballad, “The whiskey on your breath/ It could make a little boy dizzy; (Roethke)” recounts his father's drunkenness, thus setting a negative tone for the rest of the poem “But I held on like death;/ Such a waltz was not easy (Roethke). ” are implications that there is something not a seemingly pleasant memory in the poem's rhyme scheme uses assonance, so the rhyming words are not identical like “dizzy” and “easy”. ” (Roethke 2, 4). These words have slight imperfections that reflect the narrator's emotions towards his father. However, the boy has an unconditional love for his father, that love cannot mask those imperfections of the boy's father. portrayed as a drunkard, and perhaps this is why the poem leads us to believe that this is the reason