My Father's Hats

“My Father’s Hats” is a narrative, free verse poem told through the first-person perspective. The word father only appears in the poem’s title. The speaker refers to the father as “him” in the poem’s text. As a result, the poem feels intimate and private. The intimate tone implies three options: The speaker knows and trusts the reader. Alternatively, the reader gained access to the speaker’s private thoughts. Lastly, Irwin invites the reader to find a mirror of their experiences in the speaker’s circumstances.

The poem runs over a single stanza, a group of lines. The adult speaker recounts his childhood ritual of pulling up a chair to his father’s closet on Sunday mornings so the speaker can investigate his father’s hats (Lines 1-5).

The father’s dark closet conjures mystery and discovery, which Irwin enforces by skimming visual details (Line 2). Instead, he mirrors the speaker’s limited view and access by vividly describing smell and sound.

Scent, sound, and touch fit as the primary senses featured in the piece, as the boy’s height also prevents him from fully seeing the hats. Irwin uses the first four lines to establish that the speaker recalls an earlier period in his life, which Irwin indicates through the speaker’s short stature.