A Poison Tree

About the Author & Poem

William Blake (1757–1827): An influential English poet, painter, and printmaker of the Romantic age. He is famous for his collections 'Songs of Innocence' and 'Songs of Experience,' which explore the dual states of the human soul.

The Poem: "A Poison Tree" is a dark and cautionary poem about the destructive power of suppressed anger. Blake contrasts how expressing anger to a friend makes it disappear, while hiding anger from an enemy causes it to grow into a metaphorical poisonous tree. The poem illustrates how negative emotions, when nurtured with deceit and fear, can lead to spiritual and physical ruin.

I. Comprehension Questions (Brief Answers)

Answer: When the speaker expressed his anger, his anger ended.

Answer: When the speaker suppressed his anger, it only grew.

Answer: Expression of anger in the first instance relieves the person of all ill-feeling, whereas suppression of anger in the second instance poisons him all the more because it grows.

Answer: The word "grow" suggests a tree.

Answer: The speaker watered it in fears, night and morning with his tears and sunned it with smiles.

Answer: (b) the speaker was afraid of the consequences.

Answer: (c) the speaker had to go through a lot of anxiety.

Answer: (a) the speaker cunningly hid his anger with bright smiles.

Answer: "And I sunned it with smiles / And with soft deceitful wiles."

Answer: "Water'd it" and "sunned it".

Answer: (c) both his suppressed anger and a growing tree.

Answer: A poison tree with poisonous fruits.

Answer: (b) the consequence of suppressing anger.

Answer: (b) it is intended to tempt the foe.

Answer: The enemy.

Answer: (b) that the enemy entered the speaker's garden stealthily.

Answer: The speaker sees his enemy dead under the apple tree in the morning.

Answer: The enemy is physically and truly dead. But the speaker also suffers a lot of guilt for having caused this death. Though he is alive physically, he is emotionally dead.

Answer: All of the above (the tree of hatred, the destructive effect of being hypocritical, and the spiritual death for nurturing base passions).

II. Close Study (Extracts)

a. Who stole into the garden?
Answer: The speaker's enemy stole into the garden.

b. Why did he steal into the garden?
Answer: He came stealthily to steal the apple from the speaker's apple tree.

c. Explain the phrase 'veiled the pole'.
Answer: It refers to the night being so dark that even the Pole Star was hidden or covered by darkness.

a. What does the word 'it' refer to?
Answer: 'It' refers to the speaker's suppressed anger.

b. What does the word 'sunned' suggest?
Answer: As long as the speaker smiles hypocritically, his anger with his foe continues to grow. Thus, his smiles are acting upon his anger like sunshine, helping it to grow.

c. Explain the phrase "deceitful wiles".
Answer: 'Deceitful' means 'deliberately done in order to fool someone'. The speaker pretends to be friendly with his enemy by behaving in a very sweet manner.

d. Why had the speaker "sunned" it?
Answer: The speaker was afraid to express his anger with his enemy. Hence he pretended to be friendly and happy with him. This pretence only made his anger grow.

III. Paragraph Writing

Answer: The speaker waters his suppressed anger with fears and tears. He 'suns' it with smiles and deceitful wiles. The tree grows both day and night, and bears a bright apple. When the foe eats the apple, he dies. The poet thus uses the growth of a tree from a seed of anger to show how keeping negative feelings inside eventually creates a "poison" that destroys both the person who hates and the person who is hated.