2019-

The invisible worm, 

That flies in the night 
In the howling storm: 
Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy:

REFERENCE
(i) Poem: The Sick Rose
(ii) Poet: William Blake

CONTEXT
This poem is about loss of virtue due to secret crimes or corruption. The speaker, addressing a rose, informs it that it is
sick. An "invisible worm" has stolen into its "bed of crimson joy" in a "howling storm" and under the cover of night. The
"dark secret love" of this worm is destroying the rose's life.

EXPLANATION
In these lines the poet describes the cause of the sickness of a rose. Literally, a rose is a beautiful flower. Here the rose
symbolizes beauty, virginity, love, innocence and London. A canker worm has attacked this rose. This worm symbolizes
lust, jealously, corruption, experience, decay and death. It also resonates with the Biblical serpent. The poet tells that this
is an 'invisible worm'. The invisibility of the worm echoes that the devil lurks unseen and is master of disguise. This worm
flies in the night. Traditionally, night is the time when demons, witches and wild beasts seek their prey and ghosts appear.
It therefore suggests that this 'worm' is active at the time when people are most prey to their fears and fantasies. This
worm attacks 'in the howling storm'. In short, beauty, love and innocence are destroyed by lust, corruption and experience.

2018-

Oh what a multitude they seem’d, these flowers of London town!

Seated in companies they sit with radiance all their own.
The hum of multitudes was there, but multitudes of lambs,
Thousands of little boys and girls raising their innocent hands.

REFERENCE
(i) Poem: Holy Thursday
(ii) Poet: William Blake

CONTEXT
The poem describes the annual Holy Thursday service for the poor children of the London charity schools. The children
enter the cathedral in strict order ‘walking two and two’ behind the beadles (wardens). The children sit and sing, and
their voices rise up to heaven far above their aged guardians. The poem ends with a moral: have pity on those less
fortunate than yourself, as they include angelic boys and girls like those described here.

EXPLANATION
Although the children are made to enter the cathedral in regimented order, their angelic innocence overcomes all the
constraints put upon them by authority – they even make the ‘red and blue and green’ of their school uniforms look like
‘flowers of London town’. As the boys and girls raise their hands and their voices to heaven, the narrator imagines
them rising up to heaven too, just as Christ himself did on Ascension Day. 
William Blake loves lambs. They connect religion with both human and natural world. Traditionally, the lamb is a symbol
of renewal, victory of life upon death, gentleness, tenderness and innocence. White colour of the lamb stands for purity.
Moreover, lambs, as baby sheep, are connected to the theme of childhood.

2018-

Now like a mighty wind they raise to heaven the voice of song
Or like harmonious thunderings the seats of Heaven among
Beneath them sit the aged men wise guardians of the poor
Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door

REFERENCE
(i) Poem: Holy Thursday
(ii) Poet: William Blake

EXPLANATION
In this stanza, the children begin to sing. The lyrical voice describes how they “like a mighty wind they raise to heaven the
voice of song”. As they sing, the children are no longer fragile, and they acquire a force which enables them to
communicate with God (“Or like harmonious thundering the seats of Heaven among”). Notice how the song of the
children is described, first as “a mighty wind” and then as “harmonious thundering”. Moreover, the wardens that walked
with them in the streets are now “Beneath them”, overshadowed by the children and their song. The figure of the children
change throughout the stanzas and, in the last one, they appear to be surrounded by an aural imagery. The final line tells
the reader to have compassion for the poor (“Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door”). This suggests
further criticism of Christianity and English society, a possibility of divine wrath and vengeance in the children’s song.

2017-

Is that trembling cry a song?

Can it be a song of joy?
And so many children poor?
It is a land of poverty!

REFERENCE
(i) Poem: Holy Thursday
(ii) Poet: William Blake

EXPLANATION
The poem begins with a series of questions: how holy is the sight of children living in misery in a prosperous country?
Might the children’s “cry,” as they sit assembled in St. Paul’s Cathedral on Holy Thursday, really be a song? “Can it be a
song of joy?” The speaker’s own answer is that the destitute existence of so many children impoverishes the country no
matter how prosperous it may be in other ways: for these children the sun does not shine, the fields do not bear, all paths
are thorny, and it is always winter.
The city of London as a whole: the entire city has a civic responsibility to these most helpless members of their society,
yet it delegates or denies this obligation. Here the children must participate in a public display of joy that poorly reflects
their actual circumstances, but serves rather to reinforce the self-righteous complacency of those who are supposed to care
for them.
Trembling cry – By describing the children’s singing as their ‘trembling cry’, the poem stresses their vulnerability and
tenderness. ‘Trembling’ suggests the sound is weak and quavering but it also suggests that the children are fearful or close
to tears.

2016-

And I waterd it in fears,

Night & morning with my tears: 
And I sunned it with smiles,
And with soft deceitful wiles. 

REFERENCE
(i) Poem: A Poison Tree
(ii) Poet: William Blake
CONTEXT
The speaker is presenting two scenarios here. In the first, he (we're assuming it's a he) is in a tiff with his friend, a spat if
you will. But wait! There's no need to fret. He told his friend about his anger and… guess what? His anger went away.
Presto! Ah, the power of communication.
In the second scenario we get the same basic set-up here. The speaker's mad again, but this time he's mad at his enemy.
Will he follow the same route? You bet your bippy he won't. He keeps mum about his anger for his enemy and, well, that
anger just grows. The speaker's anger is only heightened by his fears, and his continued deception about his true feelings.

EXPLANATION
The speaker talks more about how his anger grows. Using figurative language, he treats this anger very much like a plant.
A plant needs water and sun in order to grow, and so apparently does his anger.
He watered it with his "fears" and his "tears" and made sure it got plenty of sunshine.
Now, we know that the speaker didn't give his anger-plant real sunshine. Instead, he gave it "smiles" and "deceitful wiles."
These are more like "fake" sunshine.
They help the plant to grow—like real sunshine would for a real plant..
A wile is a "crafty, cunning, or deceitful trick." "Deceitful wiles," then, are super-deceitful tricks (or really, really cunning
traps). The speaker suggests that he is a very deceptive person and that he is planning something very sinister and
mischievous. Whatever it is, though, his anger seems to dig it, since those deceitful schemes are like sunshine to it. 
A growing plant is usually a good, positive thing, a symbol of life. It seems ironic that a growing plant is being compared
to a growing anger. Is anger a good thing in the world of this poem?

2015-

Beneath them sit the aged men wise guardians of the poor
Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door

REFERENCE
(i) Poem: Holy Thursday
(ii) Poet: William Blake

EXPLANATION
The beadles (wardens), under whose authority the children live, are eclipsed in their aged pallor by the internal radiance of
the children. In this heavenly moment the guardians, who are authority figures only in an earthly sense, sit “beneath” the
children.
The final line advises compassion for the poor. The voice of the poem is neither Blake’s nor a child’s, but rather that of a
sentimental observer whose sympathy enhances an already emotionally affecting scene. But the poem calls upon the
reader to be more critical than the speaker is: we are asked to contemplate the true meaning of Christian pity, and to
contrast the institutionalized charity of the schools with the love of which God—and innocent children—are capable.