When Great Trees Fall is a famous poem written by American memoirist and poet, Maya Angelou. It is a metaphorical poem in which poet has explained death. The poem explore the themes of death, loss and grief.
When Great Trees Fall By Maya Angelou Summary
Summary of When Great Trees Fall By Maya Angelou
In poem, great trees symbolize those famous and great people who are no more with us.
The story of poem begins with poet who say when great trees fall then rocks on distant hills shudder, lions hides in big grasses and even big animal like Elephants looks for safety.
Here poet mean to say, when big trees fall it has so much effect that even strong animals like lion and elephant looks for safety to protect themselves from danger. And in the same way when great people died, it affect strong men and powerful people and they hide their emotions to keep themselves safe.
When big trees fall into forest, small living organism goes into silence and their senses and emotions eroded by fear. When great trees fall, then big animals like Lions and Elephants look for safety while small living creatures hide their emotions and fear through silence.
The same thing happened with human being, when their great leaders died who were their protector and advisor, their death directly affect powerful people and middle class human being. When great men died, then powerful ones hide their emotions while normal human being get scared for their future life.
When great people died, the air around us changes, it becomes light and rare which we never experienced before. We breathe briefly and our eyes see with hurtful clarity. Our memory, suddenly sharpened and examines everything.
Ours memory remembers those kind words which were unsaid. It also remembers those promised walks which were not taken. Here poet mean to say, when great people died, we remember our present and past and their promises and it affect everything.
When great souls die, ours bound reality with them goes away. Our habits and bounds which was connected with them went away. Our souls which were dependent on them, now condense and wizened. Our thoughts and mindset which was build by them has fall away. We are not so much in anger as reduced to the unutterable ignorance of dark, cold waves.
When a great souls die, their sorrow doesn’t last forever as subsequently peace serenity blooms. And that peace comes slowly and irregularly. In the starting phase of great souls death, you may feel like that everything is finished now but pain and sorrow doesn’t last long.
Because as the time passes, peace blooms eventually. Our senses starts recovering but they never be the same again and they keep whispering to our mind that they existed, they existed.
They whisper that we had a great person in our life which is not among us anymore. We can be. Be and be for they existed. Here poet mean to say, we can respect great souls legacy by becoming a better person for them.