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Sean Alexander B. Mirano

Mr. Maximino Pulan

Lit 161 - B

19 March 2019

An Analysis of “The Summer Trees”

Carlos Angeles’ “The Summer Trees” is a lyrical poem characterized by its

mimetic undertones and manifests itself with the speaker’s experience of summer

trees as an activity of memory—fully occupied with the joyful recollection of the

trees’ conditions in various weathers. It seems that the poem’s speaker is portrayed as

one who is perceptive and is an astute observer (perhaps it might it even be the poet

Angeles himself). The speaker creates the impression that he is au fait with the

summer trees’ environment; he is noted to have mentioned various months within the

year and the respective weather they bring such as the “rumors of impending May to

flood” (Angeles 6) and how “all summer long the bare trees stand and wait” (9). I

believe that the poem’s premise, and which essentially captures its reflective lyricism,

can be found in the lines “The pertinence of patience the trees bear” (4) and which I

will further expound later.

Analyzing the poem with the lens of new criticism in mind, one observes that

certain paradoxes exist due to the speaker’s poetic diction or use of words. The

speaker often utilizes the contrasting metal imageries as counterparts to the more

organic and raw sensibilities that the summer trees embody. Terms such as the

“copper sun” (1), “the noon’s burst cauldron” (2), “their metal branches” (5), and

finally the “silver in the sky” (11) evoke a pensiveness brought about by the
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conflicting images. Furthermore, it not simply these metal imageries that are opposed,

but even the organic ones as well. The idea of “the noon’s burst cauldron” (2) and

“copper sun” (1) is conflicted with the “silver in the sky” and even the trees’ peak

itself in “the april boughs” (1) and “metal branches” (5) is opposed to its base of

“roots probe deepest” (10).

As mentioned earlier, the line “The pertinence of patience the trees bear” (4) is

substantially the focal point of the poem and which consequently arranges the poem

in its climactic order. One’s attention is directed first at the top of the trees with

descriptions such as “The copper sun that scalds the april boughs” (1) and “who, with

their metal branches, scour the air” (5). After which, one’s sensibilities is heeded

downwards towards the trees’ roots through the lines “ While roots probe deepest for

a hoard of silt and seepage” (10-11). Finally, the reader’s attention is once again

directed skyward with the mention of how the “Rains pour at last, hard where the

treetops tilt” (12).

These dramatic scenes are not simply a kind of reorientation where one gazes at

the tree from top to bottom. It is also signifies the poem’s progression. Where once

“the copper sun” (1) shone, it is now replaced with the silver rains and where the

trees’ “throbbing thirst, or, to defy despair” (7) has transmuted into “Rains pour at last,

hard where the treetops tilt” (12). These trees enduring summer’s heat has at last been

satisfied through the circumstance of rain and which implies a sort of joy brought

about by the trees’ “pertinence of patience” (4).

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While one may be tempted to “scour the air” (5) or attempt to unearth the poem’s

more profound and abstruse lyrical sense, I believe that it is essentially about the

speaker’s experience in that given closed situation and nothing more. The reader is

made to reflect on the same object of which the speaker ruminates on. There is not

much room for disagreements with regards to his sentiments nor is there enough

information presented to object to his interpretation. The poem’s reflective

sensibilities are limited to the speaker’s recollection of summer trees. However, it is

not to say that the poem itself is devoid of expressing any compelling emotions. On

the contrary, the celebration of “the pertinence of patience the trees bear” (4) is

exactly what provides the poem its lyrical thought.

The speaker’s activity of recollection concerning the summer trees can be

observed to be embellished with ordinary words. As a result, the reader is able to

comprehend the poem’s dramatic situation and is given the opportunity to perceive

the same emotions as the speaker. These emotions are primarily the anticipation of a

celebration of sorts once the summer trees, dry from “the copper sun that scalds the

april boughs” (1), is finally inundated with “the late rains pour at last, hard where the

treetops tilt” (12).

It seems as if the speaker is one with the trees when it celebrates this liberating

downpour from the “silver in the sky” (11) and is finally released from the blistering

summer. Ultimately, “the pertinence of patience the trees bear”(4) is one against

summer—it is the celebration of the trees’ ability to be able to withstand the

torridness of summer until the deliverance of rain. From this somber scene of trees
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and “their throbbing thirst” (7), it then begins to develop into a jubilant spectacle

where the trees appear to rejoice at the onset of rain.

The whole poetic experience may initially seem mundane to the inattentive reader

but Carlos Angeles’ poem is anything but that. The speaker’s ability to attribute such

human characteristics to organic elements such as the trees which “the pertinence of

patience bear” (4) or with regard to how they they are “throbbing with thirst” (7)

contributes to the sense that he is one with the trees itself—empathizing with them

during the months which bring torrid summers and celebrating with them when they

finally receive water. Furthermore, it not simply the trees themselves that come alive

through the speaker’s personification, but even the trees’ environment is given life

through lines “the stirring breeze makes vocable and loud” (8). Angeles’ poem can

ultimately be interpreted not simply as an examination of flora and fauna, but is also a

celebration of the attribute of patience ascribed to the summer trees.

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References

Abad, Gémino H. A Native Clearing: Filipino Poetry and Verse from English Since the '50s

to the Present : from Edith L. Tiempo to Cirilo F. Bautista. Diliman, Quezon City:

University of the Philippines Press, 1993. Print.