Poetry Response Blog

         This poem "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" by Maya Angelou, is about freedom and liberty. The author uses a caged bird and a free bird to explain the differences between how they feel. I think that the author wasn't really meaning to talk about birds. I think that it explained a person's soul and body instead of a bird. It says that a caged bird, a soul, wants something it never had but wants it more then anything. It envies the free bird because is has something that it doesn't, freedom. While the caged bird rages, with his feet bound and his wings trimmed, the free bird flies through the open sky. The caged bird sings because he longs for freedom and cries out for it, it isn't for joy. 

         I think the author wrote this because she wanted the world to know that people should be free. She talks about how horrible life is for the caged bird and wants us to sympathize for it. When we start to feel bad for the caged bird, she brings up the free bird's happy feelings so we can compare two. Once we see the differences we want the caged bird to have the same freedom as the free bird. This inspires people to want other people to be free. People put themselves in the birds shoes and they would want to be free. She had the intention of making the world a better place.

         This poem reminds me of the movie Tangled. It reminds me of this because the main character , Rapunzel, is held captive by her "mother". She is miserable and wants to be free, like the bird from the poem. She sings for freedom instead of joy. I first thought of this Disney movie when I read that the bird dreamed of freedom that it never had. This is similar to the movie because the main character wanted to be free from her tower because she had dreamed of what it felt like. The bird and the main character of the movie Tangled are very similar.

This is the poem "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" by Maya Angelou:

A free bird leaps on the back

Of the wind and floats downstream

Till the current ends and dips his wing

In the orange suns rays

And dares to claim the sky.

But a BIRD that stalks down his narrow cage

Can seldom see through his bars of rage

His wings are clipped and his feet are tied

So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill

Of things unknown but longed for still

And his tune is heard on the distant hill for

The caged bird sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze

And the trade winds soft through

The sighing trees

And the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright

Lawn and he names the sky his own.

But a caged BIRD stands on the grave of dreams

His shadow shouts on a nightmare scream

His wings are clipped and his feet are tied

So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with

A fearful trill of things unknown

But longed for still and his

Tune is heard on the distant hill

For the caged bird sings of freedom.

This is a drawing of what I visualize when I read the poem.

I think about this because it shows a free bird and a caged bird. The caged bird is singing like it says it does in the poem. The area of the free bird is light, while the caged birds area is dark. They are separate and not in the same dimension.

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