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Thinking about the Poem

Q1. (i) Find, in the first stanza, three things that cannot happen in a treeless forest.
Answer: In a treeless forest, a bird could not sit, an insect could not hide, and the sun could not bury its feet in shadow.

(ii) What picture do these words create in your mind: “… sun bury its feet in shadow…”? What could the poet mean by the sun’s ‘feet’?
Answer: These words create a picture of the sun’s rays being completely blocked by the dense shade of the trees. The poet is using personification, imagining the sun as a person walking, and its rays as its “feet.” The idea is that the shadows from the trees are so deep that the sunlight cannot even reach the ground.

Q2. (i) Where are the trees in the poem? What do their roots, their leaves, and their twigs do?
Answer: At the beginning of the poem, the trees are inside the poet’s house. Their roots are working all night to free themselves from the veranda floor, their leaves are trying hard to move toward the glass, and their small, stiff twigs are making an effort to move out.

(ii) What does the poet compare their branches to?
Answer: The poet compares their branches to “newly discharged patients,” who are “half-dazed, moving to the clinic doors.”

Q3. (i) How does the poet describe the moon: (a) at the beginning of the third stanza, and (b) at its end? What causes this change?
Answer:
(a) At the beginning of the third stanza, the moon is described as a “whole moon” shining in an “open” sky.
(b) At the end, the moon is described as “broken like a mirror,” with its pieces flashing in the crown of the tallest oak.

The change is caused by the trees moving out of the house and blocking the view of the full moon. The branches and leaves of the trees break the image of the moon, making it appear to have shattered like a mirror.

(ii) What happens to the house when the trees move out of it?
Answer: When the trees move out of the house, the “smell of leaves and lichen” still reaches inside the rooms. The house becomes a place from which the forest has departed, leaving behind a silence where there were once whispers.

(iii) Why do you think the poet does not mention “the departure of the forest from the house” in her letters?
Answer: The poet might not mention the departure of the forest in her letters because it is a very strange, almost embarrassing event that is hard to explain to others. It’s a surreal and personal experience that she knows others would not understand or believe.

Q4. (i) Does the poem present a conflict between man and nature? Compare it with A Tiger in the Zoo. Is the poet suggesting that plants and trees, used for ‘interior decoration’ in cities while forests are cut down, are ‘imprisoned’, and need to ‘break out’?
Answer: Yes, the poem presents a conflict between man and nature. The trees are trapped inside the house, and they are struggling to break free and return to their natural habitat, the forest. This is similar to the tiger in the zoo, who is also imprisoned and longs for freedom. The poet is suggesting that when we use nature for our own selfish purposes, like cutting down forests to decorate our homes, we are essentially imprisoning it, and it will eventually fight to break free.

(ii) What new meanings emerge from the poem if you take its trees to be symbolic of this particular meaning?
Answer: If we take the trees to be symbolic of human beings, the poem takes on a new meaning. It could represent the suppression of women who are confined to their homes, or any group of people who are not free to live their lives. The struggle of the trees to break out of the house could symbolise a person’s desire for freedom, liberation, and a life outside of confinement.

Q5. You may read the poem On Killing a Tree by Gieve Patel (Beehive – Textbook in English for Class IX, NCERT). Compare and contrast it with the poem you have just read.
Answer: On Killing a Tree describes the process of killing a tree in a very detached, step-by-step manner, highlighting the tree’s incredible resilience. The Trees, in contrast, describes the trees as active agents of change, moving on their own to reclaim their space. Both poems deal with the relationship between humans and nature. On Killing a Tree focuses on the destructive act of humans against nature, while The Trees shows nature’s power to fight back against human confinement.

Homophones

• refuse (verb): to not accept something; refuse (noun): garbage or trash.
• dove (verb): past tense of dive; dove (noun): a type of bird.
• invalid (adjective): not valid or legally binding; invalid (noun): a person who is weak or disabled.