The speaker begins with a simple confession: he got angry with a friend, spoke up, and the anger ended. With an enemy, he did the opposite—he said nothing, and the anger swelled. He describes tending that hidden grudge like a plant, watering it with his own tears, giving it fake sunlight from his smiles and cunning tricks. The wrath grows into a bright, tempting apple. The enemy, seeing it, sneaks into the garden at night and takes it. In the morning, the speaker feels glad seeing his foe dead under the tree. The speaker’s voice is chillingly calm, almost proud of his patient cultivation of a murderous trap. The mood is claustrophobic and unsettling: a nursery-rhyme lilt coats a story of emotional poison, showing how unspoken bitterness can turn a person into a smiling destroyer. There’s no remorse, only a quiet triumph that leaves the reader uneasy.
A POISON TREE — Summary
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.