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 & 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.
MEANING OF DIFFICULT WORDS
Wrath - strong, stern, or fierce anger; deeply resentful indignation; ire.
Deceit distortion of the truth for the purpose of misleading; duplicity; fraud;
cheating
3.
Wiles Trick, trap
4.
Veiled conceal, lacking clarity or distinctness
1.
2.

1.
-

POETIC/LITERARY DEVICES
Personification
Waters the wrath with fear
I told my wrath, my wrath did end

2.

Metaphor
-The tree is considered as a wrath/anger
-"Till it bore an apple bright", the apple is a metaphor for the "fruit" of his
grudge.

3.

Alliteration
-sunned and smiles
-friend and foe
-bore and bright

4.

Imagery
- Throughout the poem

5.

Irony
-the foe beneath the tree of hatred

6.

Repitition
-I was angry with my friend I was angry with my foe

7.

Allusion
-"Garden.. apple...tree" alludes to Adam & Eve, the Garden of Eden.
STANZA BY STANZA ANALYSIS
Stanza 1: William Blake speaks of someone, his friend and his foe, whom has he
is angry with. When he says I told my wrath, my wrath did end after he said he
was angry with his friend, he is saying he was able to get over being angry with
his friend and forgot about it. Although, it is quite the opposite when he
mentions I told it not, and my wrath did grow. Blake is saying that with his
enemy, he allowed himself to get angry, and therefore, his wrath did grow.
Stanza 2: In this stanza, Blake begins to make his anger grow and he takes
pleasure in it, comparing his anger with something, in this case, a tree or plant.
The speaker says he sunned it with smiles and and with soft, deceitful wiles.
This means he is creating an illusion with his enemy saying he is pretending to
be friendly to seduce and bring him closer.
Stanza 3: And it grew both day and night and til it bore an apple bright are
meaning that his illusion with his enemy is growing and growing until it became a
strong and tempting thing. His illusion has a metaphor and it is an apple. After,
his foe believes it shines, which means he thinks its true and means something,
and takes Blake illusion seriously. And he knew it was mine suggests that he
really thinks Blake is his friend.
Stanza 4: Being the last stanza, Blake needed to come up with a conclusion. He
has used the two lines in the morning glad I see and my foe outstretched
beneath the tree to say that his foe finally fell to his tempting illusion and
metaphorically, consumed his poison apple and died. So, obviously, his malicious
intentions were hidden behind illusion and he prevailed over his enemy.
CRITICAL APPRECIATION
In the first stanza, the consequence of allowing anger to continue instead of
stopping it as it begins is shown. This consequence is simply that it will continue
to grow. However, as the poem progresses, it is seen that this continued growth
of anger can yield harmful results as the enemy, or foe, is lured toward the tree
and eats of its fruit, the poison apple. This kills his foe, as he is seen outstretched
beneath the tree, a sight the speaker is glad to see the next morning. These final
two lines explain one of the main themes of the poem, which is that anger leads
to self-destruction. The speakers anger grows and eventually becomes so
powerful that it has changes from simple anger with another person, to desire to
see them dead. One of the subjects of Blakes work was the underworld, or Hell,
and knowing this, it can be seen that the destruction which results from anger is
not physical, but spiritual. In addition, the death of the foe, which the speaker is

glad to see, does not spiritually affect the foe as the speaker is affected, but only
physically harms the foe.

READING MATERIAL
Interpretation and Symbolism
After reading such an amoral poem, the search for hope or alternate meaning
begins. A metaphor lives inside the poem, but instead of making the poem less
wicked, the analogy confuses and questions faith.
Symbolically, the speaker represents God, the foe and garden represent Adam
and Eve in the Garden of Eden, and the tree represents the Tree of Knowledge of
Good and Evil in Genesis. If this analogy is true, it shows God rejoicing in killing
his enemies, which most people think the God they know would never do.
Blakes poem is peculiar even for todays standards, and his analogy may be
ruthless and insensitive, but he does get the reader thinking. By looking further
into the poem, we find that the speaker nourishes and feeds his wrath, which
symbolically is the tree from the Garden of Eden. Is Blake suggesting that God
fed his wrath and anger into the tree and intended for man to eat from it? If so,
He is creating a world doomed to His wrath and anger, an idea just about
anybody would shutter at.
Note:
William Blake was an English Dissenter and Dissenter members broke away from
the Anglican Church. Dissenters believed that the policies of the Anglican
Church were wrong and so opposed it. Blake began writing a collection of poems
called Songs of Experience to protest the Anglican Church's policy of stifling
"sinful" emotions in people, such as anger. A Poison Tree is a good example of
this because it shows how Blake believed that stifling anger would only cause the
anger to grow. In fact, Blake even decided to call the original draft of a Poison
Tree, "Christian Forebearance." However, the English government did not tolerate
the radical actions of the English Dissenters and they persecuted them.

2. A discussion on the poem 'A POISON TREE' by William Blake

A Poison Tree
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.

Wiles

A trick to deceive
A wile is a cunning trick. Here, it suggests that he may be planning
some sort of a devious scheme for his enemy

Wrath

Extreme anger

Foe

An enemy

Outstretch

Stretch out/ extend/ spread out

Veiled

When the night veiled the pole

A concealing cover

pole

North pole/ South pole

Watered it
in fears and
sunned it
with smiles

he "waters" and "suns" his anger, much like one would water and
provide sunlight for a tree.
As the poem puts it, he "waters" the anger with his tears, and then
"suns" it with the false smiles he offers his enemy.
The poet means for us to see ourselves in the persona who nurtured
his anger at his enemy by watering it with his "tears" and sunning it
with his deceitful "smiles." If we stuff down our anger, pretend we're
happy, and don't resolve our conflicts, our anger will grow and grow
until it becomes like a poisonous plant that will hurt other people.

Till it bore an
apple bright.
And my foe
beheld it
shine.

Bore : to produce or yield

Past tense of bear
( bear fruits)

Beheld it shine : see it shining

The narrator explains that the plant (his anger) grew "both day and
night" until it produced fruit. The narrator says that it is an apple, but
it's simply a metaphor for a lure. The speaker uses that apple to lure
his enemy into the garden and be poisoned.

Then he grows angry at an enemy. Rather than communicate with his

enemy and hash the problem out, he holds the anger inside. As the
poem puts it, he "waters" the anger with his tears, and then "suns" it
with the false smiles he offers his enemy.
Eventually, this anger grows and grows until it becomes a tree that
bears a shiny, poisonous apple. The enemy eats the apple and dies.

Metaphor-A growing apple tree is an extended metaphor for the growing anger
and it shows how destructive anger can be. The title A Poison Tree is the
central metaphor. The apple has become poisonous as it has been
nurtured with anger. In other words, the tree grew with negative
emotions. When we stay angry for a long time, we may become A
Poison Tree (a person full of negative emotions).
Setting-The personas garden. The garden where the apple tree grows. The
apple tree that features the apple which lures the enemy.

Symbolism-The apple represents anger. The apple grows large till it ripens.
Similarly, anger grows till it becomes vengeance.

Themes:
Managing Anger: It is not totally wrong to be angry. However, it is rather
important for us to know how to deal with anger. If we nurture our anger, it
might grow and be harmful to us. In this poem, two ways of handling anger
were shown with different outcomes. In the first scenario, the
anger disappeared but in the second the anger grew into something
aggressive and negative.
Importance of Communication: As shown in the poem, if the persona had
communicated with his enemy, his anger would have been controlled. However,
his refusal to communicate has allowed anger to become something that is very
destructive. Therefore it is oftenbetter if we can communicate with people
on the issues that is bugging us. The poet indirectly is trying to persuade his
readers to talk about their anger. We can talk about it not only with our friends
but with our enemies too. If we talk, the anger might just reduce and it might just
ease our troubles. In turn, it will prevent us from causing hurt unto others.

Moral Value

The poem tells us about the disastrous consequences of ones own failure
to communicate with another person.
Compliments to leelachakrabarty for these info :
https://leelachakrabarty.wordpress.com/2016/04/18/the-poem-a-poisontree/
What is the poem about:
"A Poison Tree" examines the effects of unresolved anger.
In the poem, the narrator or persona first gets angry at a friend. He talks to his
friend and that dialogue resolves his problem so that he can forgive his friend.
Then he grows angry at an enemy. Rather than communicate with his enemy and
hash the problem out, he holds the anger inside.
As the poem puts it, he "waters" the anger with his tears, and then "suns" it with
the false smiles he offers his enemy.
Eventually, this anger grows and grows until it becomes a tree that bears a
shiny, poisonous apple. The enemy eats the apple and dies.
Our personal connection to poem:
The poet means for us to see ourselves in the persona who nurtured his anger at
his enemy by watering it with his "tears" and sunning it with his deceitful
"smiles." If we stuff down our anger, pretend we're happy, and don't resolve our
conflicts, our anger will grow and grow until it becomes like a poisonous plant
that will hurt other people. The poet shows us a different and healthier path in
the first stanza, where the persona confronts the friend who makes him angry
and works out the problem. The poem suggests that we have a choice about how
we behave and that resolving our issues with others is far better than letting
them fester.
Sources:
http://www.enotes.com/topics/poison-tree/themes

What is the moral of

In this Blake poem, an individual who hides and nurses his

the poem "A poison

tree?"

anger is contrasted with a person who goes immediately

and tells his "friend" why he is angry.
The person who confesses his anger is able to get over it
and move on.
The person who buries it from his "enemy" pretends
everything is all right. Meanwhile, beneath the surface, the
anger festers.
The man waters his anger with his tears and suns it with
false smiles. By doing this he cultivates his anger so that it
grows bigger and bigger.
Finally, the anger grows into a tree that bears poisonous
fruit.
The moral of the poem is that we should not nurse our
anger towards another person but confront the person who
hurt us and work out our issues directly. Otherwise, we
become something poisonous that destroys other people.

In the poem "A

Poison Tree" why did
the persona's wrath
end when he told his
friend about it?

In "The Poison Tree," the point of the poem is that the anger
we hold onto grows into something ugly and poisonous that
hurts other people.

Blake contrasts this to anger we get over.

One good way to overcome anger is to talk about it with the
person who angered you. If you can trust another person
enough to confide in him and her, you can clear up
misunderstandings and give the other person the
opportunity to tell his side of the story and explain what
happened. It also offers the other person the chance to
apologize, because often people don't even know they have
offended. With this kind of communication, forgiveness and
reconciliation can occur. Then you can move on with your
life.

In contrast, as the poem shows, if you dwell on your wrath

without trying to resolve it, it becomes bigger and bigger

and more and more poisonous--Blake imagines it as a
poisonous apple--and becomes especially poisonous if you
pretend to the person who offended you that nothing is
wrong.

In "The Poison Tree," the persona deals with his anger while
How did the persona
of "A Poison Tree"
deal with his anger
while his enemy was
alive? Give two
things he did.

his enemy is still alive by nurturing it.

He does this in two ways. First, as Blake puts it, he "water'd
it in fears / night and morning with my tears." This means
that when the persona wakes up in the morning and when
he goes to bed at night he remembers over and over how he
has been hurt by his enemy. He dwells on his "fears": how
his enemy could hurt him again, and he thinks about his
enemy with "tears" over the original injury.
The persona also pretends that nothing is wrong. Blake
states it this way: "I sunn'd it [his anger] with smiles / And
with soft deceitful wiles." Rather than confront his enemy or
talk it through, the persona stuffs his anger down and
pretends everything is fine. He smiles at his enemy. He is
kind on the surface to his enemy. Meanwhile, the unresolved
anger grows and grows.
We don't know how the enemy injured the persona, but the
poem leads us to believe that whatever it was, the persona
blows it (or grows it) all out of proportion both by dwelling on
it silently and by pretending publicly that he is happy.
Sources:
http://www.enotes.com/topics/poison-tree/themes

Stanza 1 :
Blake comments on the need to confront a problem if peace and happiness are to
prevail. When the speaker "tells" his wrath, it "ends," but when he "tells it not," his
anger "grows." Like an apple seed falling onto fertile soil, the speakers repressed
anger germinates and becomes the one obsession in his life. In the first couplet,
Blake conveys the image of a plant being uprooted, nipping in the bud (as it were) a
misunderstanding between the speaker and his friend. In sharp contrast, the speaker
holds back from admitting anger to his foe in the following couplet, allowing it to
fester within. With simple language, Blake neatly establishes the root of the poem,
ending this first stanza with the foreshadowing "grow" (4).
Stanza 2:
It depicts the speakers treatment and nurturing behavior towards his internalized
wrath, as he tends to it like a beloved plant; here, Blake stresses the "wrath = plant"
metaphor that is inherent to the poem. His anger becomes a living entity that he
"waters" and "suns" with "tears" and "wiles," and making it to grow "both night and
day" (9), hinting at his unfolding scheme against his foe. In describing his attentive
care towards this wrath/plant, the speaker unintentionally reveals his unnatural
obsession with getting revenge, while pointing to the slowly emerging anger as a
force of its own that slowly consumes the speaker.
Stanza 3:
The speakers vigilance results in "an apple bright" (10) in the third stanza similar
to the apple from the Tree of Forbidden Knowledge, this fruit stands at once as a
harbinger of danger and a tantalizing temptation for the speakers unsuspecting foe.
The speaker becomes the Serpent that tempted Eve, capitalizing on and exploiting
the Deadly Sin of Envy by allowing his foe to "behold its shine" (11). The crafty
speaker brags about reading his foes mind: "And my foe beheld it shine, / and he
knew that it was mine" (11-12), implying the ease with which he could fool his enemy
by taking advantage of his foes natural curiosity and covetousness. Blake ends this
stanza with a comma instead of a period, accelerating the fatal line of action into the
fourth and final stanza, filling the reader with dread and anticipation.
The foe falls for the ruse, deceptive in his own right as he stealthily slips into the
speakers garden to steal the shiny object (and proving the speakers suspicions
right). Blake combines the acts of breaking and entering and of theft into the word

"stole" at the end of Line 13 (an ironic line choice, too, if one is superstitious), with no
ending punctuation that would let the reader hesitate or stop for a breath.

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:
(Lines 11-14)
Stanza 4:
When taken together, these four lines powerfully sweep the reader into the poems climax.
Under veil of night, envy and curiosity get the better of the foe as the speaker foresaw
sneaking into the garden as darkness envelopes the "pole" or tree, implying that whatever
the foes intentions, they will remain unknown. The reader waits with anticipation and dread
for the final blow, knowing what will come yet wanting to see how ends. Blake further adds to
the drama by ending Line 14 with a colon, setting up the reader for what s/he thinks will be
the poems most powerful image.
Yet the reader does not learn what happens to the foe. The final image conveyed in the last
couplet is of the foe lying "outstretched beneath the tree" (16), breaking the poems flow of
action by flashing forward to the following morning. With the dawn comes the poems
resolution: the speaker is "glad [to] see" his foe dead, apparently from ingesting the poison
apple. The speaker seems satisfied that his scheme of deception has worked, getting rid of
his source of wrath by poisoning it with his unchecked anger and desire for revenge.
But why does Blake omit the murder scene from the story? Perhaps he wants to emphasize
the murderous means the speaker has taken to avenge himself of his enemy. More
accurately, Blake reflects the speakers frame of mind in this omission: as he wants to kill his
enemy, he also wishes to kill his conscience, blotting out the act of murder as he blots out
the source of his irrational anger. The speaker realizes he is morally wrong, but gets so
caught up in the moment and the seeming brilliance of his scheme that cannot stop himself
from seeing it through. Unchecked anger drives the speaker to commit this murderous act,
anger he cannot or refuses to acknowledge from the start of the poem. The mortal sin of
murder will forever stain his hands he cannot go on with living unless he suppresses the
event, as he did his wrath.
"A Poison Tree" is a confession without actually naming or describing the crime itself. The
speaker takes the time to brag about how he implemented his plan, without admitting his
crime. Thus this poems impact lies in the dangers that can arise from allowing ones anger
to grow unchecked and take over our minds, hearts, and souls, like a wild plant in the garden
of our experience.