Throughout the basis of time. The bonds of families shine through dark, melancholy days. In the Black Walnut Tree, Mary Oliver deliberately expresses the bond between family is stronger than any material object. Her use of imagery, POV, and allegory allow us an insight into the true meaning at hand. The poem begins as any normal story would. The depiction of the family tree being cut down by a “lumberman [to] pay off the mortgage.” The tree itself has lost its material value, for “some storm...will churn down its dark boughs.” The reflection of dark boughs could stand for the families routes being deep in depression. For, WWII had just ended and “the two woman trying to be wise” were deciding whether or not to sell the family tree. However, the young woman and her mother knew they’d “crawl with shame in the emptiness” they made. The tree wasn’t just any tree; it was one with extreme sentimental…show more content… The tree “leaves are getting heavier every year” which can be directly translated into the young woman and her mother getting repressed every year , as their family members began to pass on. The tree is the embodiment of a family tree. One in which, holds the dreams and memories “of fresh and generous Ohio with leaves and vineyards and orchards.” One night, the young woman had a dream which envisioned “her fathers out of Bohemia.” Representing a means of hope. The woman was hoping her fathers were frolicking in “blue fields” and that tree was their way of connecting to her and her mom. Soon realizing demolishing the tree would be an insult to her ancestors, the mother and daughter decided the walnut tree would “swing through another year of sun and leaping winds.” The money the tree could have provided for the struggling pair no longer mattered; and were ready to bear the “whipcrack of the mortgage” month after
