The Secret Heart
Robert P. Tristram Coffin
Across the years he could recall
His father one way best of all.
In the stillest hour of night
The boy awakened to a light.
Half in dreams, he saw his sire
With his great hands full of fire.
The man had struck a match to see
If his son slept peacefully.
He held his palms each side the spark
His love had kindled in the dark.
His two hands were curved apart
In the semblance of a heart.
He wore, it seemed to his small son,
A bare heart on his hidden one,
A heart that gave out such a glow
No son awake could bear to know.
It showed a look upon a face
Too tender for the day to trace.
One instant, it lit all about,
And then the secret heart went out.
But it shone long enough for one
To know that hands held up the sun.
First Thoughts
1. In your opinion, what is the most important word or phrase in the poem? Explain your choice.
Shaping Interpretations
2. What does the boy realize about his father? How does he come to this realization?
3. What do the father’s hands holding the match symbolize for the son?
4. What do you think is the meaning of the last two lines, in which the son realizes that “hands held up the sun”? Whose hands are they?
5. How does the expression “Little things mean a lot” relate to this poem?
Connecting with the Text
6. The speaker says that the father’s love was “too tender for the day to trace.” Why do people sometimes hide their feelings from those they love?
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