Analyze Poem: "A Poison Tree" by William Blake

 

A.    INTRODUCTION

     In this case, there are several reasons why I choose “A Poison Tree” as my poem discussion. First of all, this poem is written by William Blake, a very well-known poet for his soulful originality and lofty imagination. Second, this poem uses beautiful language and lyrical quality. Furthermore, this poem is simple and short yet contains common problem that we usually face in our life and is set out to make a moral point to the readers. In addition, what we are trying to emphasize most in this poem is how the speaker repressing his anger and the consequences of doing so. Well, the following are things that what we can find in this poem and what we are going to discuss:

1.   The poem contains anger feeling

2.   The poem contains deception

3.   The poem contains communication

4.   The poem’s stanza by stanza meanings

5.   The poem’s overall meaning/interpretation

6.   The poem’s moral values

B.     DISCUSSION

A Poison Tree   – William Blake

I was angry with my friend:
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.

And I watered it in fears
Night and morning with my tears,
And I sunned it with smiles
And with soft deceitful wiles.

And it grew both day and night,
Till it bore an apple bright,
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine, –

And into my garden stole
When the night had veiled the pole;
In the morning, glad, I see
My foe outstretched beneath the tree.

1.   The Poem Contains Anger Feeling

 

Anger is the basic human emotion which sets the events of this poem in motion. Although it is not necessarily wrong in itself, how we go about dealing with anger is extremely important.

‘I was angry with my friend:/ I told my wrath, my wrath did end:/ I was angry with my foe:/ I told it not, my wrath did grow.

The first stanza (lines that make up a section of a poem) contrasts two different ways of dealing with anger and the two different outcomes that may occur as a result.

 2. The Poem Contains Deception

Deception can be found in this poem where the speaker bottles things up and does not talk about his feelings to his enemy sneaks into the garden in the dead of night to take the fruit.

‘And he knew that it was mine:/ And into my garden stole’

‘Stole’ is an interesting choice of word. While it has the clear meaning that the enemy sneaked in under cover of darkness it also reminds the reader that it is an act of theft.

3.   The Poem Contains Communication

The poet/speaker communicates a direct moral lesson to the reader about the disastrous consequence of his own failure to communication with another person.

‘I told my wrath’, ‘I told it not’

This simple but direct use of antithesis (the use of opposites) shows how simple it would be to talk about an issue but equally how easy it is to say nothing and let resentment grow.

4.3.   The Poem’s Stanza by Stanza Meanings

STANZA 1:

I was angry with my friend:
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.

I had misunderstanding with my friend and was angry, I told my friend about my wrath, I got over my anger and forgot it. I got angry with my foe, I did not tell him about it. I bottled up my wrath and it intensified. It grew and grew like a plant.

STANZA 2:

And I watered it in fears
Night and morning with my tears,
And I sunned it with smiles
And with soft deceitful wiles.

My anger grew like a tree. I nourished my anger-tree with anger, suspicion and hatred. I was suspicious of my foe and I was angry with him. But I tricked him to bring him closer to me. Outwardly, I smiled and I was friendly to gain his trust.

STANZA 3:

And it grew both day and night,
Till it bore an apple bright,
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine, –

My ‘tree’ was poisonous because it was full of anger, hatred and suspicion. Later, it bore a shiny poison apple. My foe saw it and knew it was mine.

STANZA 4:

And it grew both day and night,
Till it bore an apple bright,
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine, –

One night when there were no stars, my foe came into my garden and stole my poison apple. He fell into my trap, he ate the apple and died. In the morning, I was happy to see him lying dead under my poison tree.

5.   The Poem’s Overall Meaning/Interpretation

     A poison tree is a short and deceptively simple poem about repressing anger and the consequences of doing so. The speaker tells of how they fail to communicate his wrath to his foe and how this continues to grow until it develops into poisonous hatred. Then, the speaker describes how when he is angry with a friend and talks to his friend about the issue which helps them to overcome his anger. However, the speaker is unable to do the same with an enemy and this leads to developing resentment and an even stronger degree of hatred. An extended metaphor of a tree growing in the speaker’s garden demonstrated how the anger continues to grow. In the lines and I water’d it in fears’ and ‘And I sunned it with smiles’ the speaker actively cultivates the tree/anger. Eventually, the anger blossoms into a poisoned fruit, the enemy eats the fruit and dies and the speaker seems to be glad of this. However, there is also a sense that they see the destructiveness of what has occurred. As the first line acknowledge, we can easily overcome our anger if we communicate it properly.

6.      The Poem’s Moral Values

·      We must not put wrath and hatred against anyone

·      Suppressing anger is bad for us and those around us

·      When there is a misunderstanding, we should talk about it to resolve our differences

·      When there is a misunderstanding, we should forgive and forget

C.    CONCLUSION

     In conclusion, in this poem, the speaker tells us the difference when he is angry with his friend and his foe. He can easily overcome his anger if he communicates it with his friend, but he cannot do so to his foe. His anger is full of hatred and growing like a poisonous tree in his garden. Later, his poison tree bears a poison apple which tempts his foe. His foe creeps like a thief in the darkness of the night and steals his apple. Then, he eats it and lies dead under the poison tree in his garden. The next morning, the speaker is happy that his foe is dead.

D.    REFERENCES

1.   It was accessed on September, 29^th 2019

     https://www.shortpoems.org/poets/william-blake/

2.   It was accessed on September, 2^nd  2019

     https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zg4rg82/revision/4










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