“The Poison Tree” from Songs of Experience by William Blake is a poem that tells the story of someone who is swallowed by the hatred felt towards an enemy. This individual begins by recounting the anger he felt towards a friend who is told about the protagonist's anger and in doing so diffuses it. On the contrary, anger towards an enemy remains repressed and the feeling becomes embittered. This resentment grows and grows until it becomes a tree bearing an apple of hate. The enemy steals and eats the apple, is poisoned, and the next morning is found lying lifeless under the tree of wrath. He whose hatred brought the apple is happy to see that his enemy has suffered and died. However, although for the moment they are happy and the apple is no longer there, the tree remains watered and grown with tears and disgust. This hatred will continue to cause the character to grow and produce more apples for the rest of his life. “The Poison Tree” suggests that although hatred is poisonous to the one at whom it is directed, it causes more suffering to the one who harbors the emotion, an idea that Blake conveys through the use of metaphors, allusions, and language. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay First, Blake introduces the metaphor of hatred as a tree in the second stanza of the poem. However, he clarifies that this tree is atypical, stating, “And it grew both day and night.” (9) as well as “I watered it with fears, / Night and morning with my tears” (5). This tree is different in the sense that it grows both during the day and at night, implying that the character keeps the tree inside himself like any normal plant now grows at night when there is no sun. Beyond that, the tree feeds on the character's emotions: fear, pain, and anger. The tree bears deadly fruit in the form of an apple, but an apple tree never produces a single apple. Apple trees are gigantic and produce hundreds of apples, many of which fall to the ground and rot. These fallen apples decompose and return nutrients to the apple tree, resulting in a never-ending growth cycle. This is the same with anger. Anger that remains unexpressed breeds further resentment. With the phrase "And in the morning I am happy to see"; (15) Blake says that the character is happy to see the fall of his enemy. However, the tree remains with the character, and as its roots continue to grow and gnaw at his sense of self, he becomes further infected with destructive feelings. Likewise, in the phrase “Till it bore an apple bright”. (10) Blake makes an allusion to the story of Adam and Eve in which Eve is tempted by a serpent to eat the forbidden fruit, an apple, which symbolizes human sin. In “The Poison Tree” the apple symbolizes hatred, but in both cases the tree remains and produces many human “apples” that hate. The single apple that is taken greatly affects the enemy in Blake's poem as well as the human race in the story of Adam and Eve, but despite the fact that the apple is gone, the tree is completely unaffected. As the metaphorical tree remains firmly rooted in the character's mind, it is bound to continue to poison him with feelings of anger and resentment. The third way Blake conveys the message of hatred that hurts those who harbor it is through the use of language. In the first half of the poem, Blake repeats the word “I” over and over again, for example “I was angry with my enemy:/ I said not, my wrath grew.” (3) and “And I watered it with fears, / Night and morning with my tears: / And I sunned it with my smiles, / And with sweet deceitful wiles.” (5). In contrast, once the second half of the poem begins, Blake shifts the use of "I" to the use of.