The tone of this poem is sad and serious. One example of this is, But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams.
When describing the free bird, Angelou uses bright and happy words such as dawn, sun rays, and bright lawn. When she is talking about the caged bird, however, she uses dark words such as fearful, rage, and nightmare.
And dips his wing in the orange sun rays, and dares to claim the sky. Angelou is showing the reader that the bird is free to fly the beautiful, radiant sky with no boundaries.
This poem is unstructured. Sometimes it rhymes, the number of syllables per line is inconsistent, and there is some repetition. This is a free verse poem.
The two main themes in this poem are freedom and captivity. The free bird represents white people, while the caged bird represents the oppressed African American people.
T - TONE
W - WORD CHOICE
I - IMAGERY
S - STYLE
T - THEME
DREAMS
HOPES
FUTURE
OPPORTUNITY
But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed forstill