Distance is a problem in many homes, whether due to emotional or physical distance or perhaps simply because the word love is not pronounced enough, whether in Robert Hayden's poem "Those Winter Sundays" and "Daystar" by Rita Dove is a distant parent, are they selfish or mean, or is the love they show simply not understood? In Robert Hayden's poem "Those Winter Sundays" he shows that children have difficulty understanding why a parent is distant from the speaker he says “Even on Sundays my father rose early and dressed/in the blue-black cold,” (Line 1 -2) the father also gets up very early on Sundays because in the “cold blue-black” the speaker doesn't seem to understand why the father does this because he gets up so early day after day? He seems to ask himself. The speaker observes that "...With chapped hands, sore from weekday toil/Burning fires" (lines 3-5) the father works hard for his family, his hands are chapped and sore and he gets up even before the others in his family and lights the fire to heat the house for them. Distant parents even if they have good intentions and try to convey their love to their families through actions or deeds as the speaker states "No one has ever thanked him" the father does not see himself as equally loving towards the child. (Line 5) The speaker says "I will get up and get dressed, fearing the chronic anger of that house", there is usually a lot of tension and fear in a family with poor communication skills, the mother and father may argue or often arguing or the distant parent, if not both, may be angry because the child does not understand their love and compassion. Children grow up to be indifferent and insensitive to the actions that parents do for the family as speaking... in the middle of paper ......and that was his for an hour” (Lines 16-20) when they make love she daydreams about time spent with herself and the only thing she has are her thoughts that she has no desire to love her husband, as the speaker explains, she thinks of the place "where she [it's] nothing, pure nothing, in the middle of the day." (Lines 20-22) In Robert Hayden's poem "Those Winter Sundays" there is a father who loves his son and does kind things for his family works hard getting up early every day and "No one ever thanked him" (Hayden Line 5) and in "Daystar" by Rita Where there is the mother who is deeply depressed and not happy the life she has is unhappy it was that of a mother and she follows the movements of everyday life because she has to do it as a mother. Children never benefit from distance at home, rarely understand it and never feel loved.