To A Daughter Leaving Home by Linda Pastan Explication

I chose To A Daughter Leaving Home by Linda Pastan because it is relatable to me in my move to college in the near future. It has a sing-songy flow which mirrors the child in the scene. The title is what clues the reader in to the true meaning. That this poem is not about a girl riding her bike, but it is about a daughter taking her first step towards independence and leaving the nest.  The narrator is presumably the parent or caretaker. He or she is the one who taught their daughter to first ride a bike. The bike symbolizes independence.  The parents are the ones who initially taught their children to do things for themselves. At first, the daughter “wobbled away” on her bike. The unsteadiness suggests that is was not an easy move to leave home. However, she quickly “pulled/ ahead down the curved path”. So, although rocky at the start, the daughter found her balance both physically riding a bike and in her new life away from home. The parent says: “I kept waiting for the thud of your crash” suggesting she was expecting her daughter to fail at some point. However, the daughter proved them wrong, for she kept pedaling on. Throughout the poem, the daughter edges further and further away from her parent who remains at the starting point, watching the whole time. The poem concludes with the last line being “goodbye”. The tone of this line sounds as if the parent is saying bye to their child however, in context, it is the child nonverbally and unconsciously saying goodbye to the parent. This makes me believe that the daughter naively never said goodbye because she was so caught up in what was in front of her, leaving her parents behind.