The cap could be a symbol for the speaker's admiration and proud for his dad and the working class. This is perceptible in the first stanza, where the speaker wears the cap with a sense of admiration. He wants to be like his father, to be working class. The meaning changes when the poem changes; when the father dies. The cap lies upside-down, what is a visual image of the change. It looks like he is a beggar, what changes the speaker's attitude. He feels as if his father is humiliated by this fact and by the staring crowd. His attitude towards the middle class gets even more negative in the last stanza. The meaning of the cap seems ironic: the speaker collects money with the cap from the crowd, as if his dead father is a street artist. The harsh words like 'trap' and 'busk' show that he is angry because of his father's death. The cap seems to show their growing connection the son feels, because of the father's death.
One meaning of the title could be related from the sentence: "(...) made me look more "working class"(...) bridge that gap!)" This shows that his father is working class and he is not. T Harrison used to be working class until he went to grammar school and became middle class. When assuming that this is an autobiographical poem we could assume that the speaker undergoes the same change and this could be the meaning of the title.
When the father is found dead is the change in the poem. When that happens the appearance of the father and the speaker himself change. The father seemed an invulnerable and proud person to the speaker. "Death's reticence crowns his life's". This could mean that he lived longer than it was common for working class. When he dies he becomes a vulnerable and mortal person, and the speaker finds this out too. Because of his father's death, the speaker becomes angry and averted to the middle class.
His father's cap is turned inside up because of his falling down, it looks as if he is begging for money. This fact reveals this turn in the speaker's attitude towards the middle class. He was in the first stanza already more appealed by the working class. His father's death is probably caused by hard work for a middle class-boss. In the line "I'm opening my trap to busk the class that broke him ( ...)" this anger is exposed.
The cap can have different meanings. It can stand for the admiration and proud the speaker has for his father. The meaning changes into humiliation of the father, through the upside-down cap. This image is used ironically by the speaker, he is collecting money in the cap as if his father is an attraction. The title can also have various explanations. It could mean the speaker's turning into middle class, if taking the poem autobiographical. Another possibilities are the turn in the father's appearance in the eyes of his son and the change in the speaker's attitude.
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