In the next stanza the poet wonders where the fire used to make the eyes of the tiger was derived from. Was it taken from the heights of heaven or the depths of hell? coming back to the creator, he ponders upon the wings of the creator to be able to fly to such extreme highs and lows and the hands he must have to actually take the fire and carry it back and in the line “what the hand dare seize the fire”. In the last two line of the stanza the word “dare” is repeated and implies the courage, challenge and the power of the creator.
In the third stanza the poet ponders upon the physical strength and the mental ability of the creator to plan as well as carry out the creation of the tiger as in the line “ad what shoulder and what art could twist the sinews of the heart in which the “shoulder” symbolizes physical ability and “art” stands for imagination. He asks what kind of shoulders or muscles the creator has to bend and twist the muscles of the heart of the tiger while being made. Through the word “twist” the poet implies the hardness of the heart of the tiger [because of its violent character]. He also asks about the imagination of the creator to actually think of such a thing as the tiger and then make its shape so flawlessly. And in the next line the poet says that the moment when the tiger comes alive in one that’s dreadful. The coming to life of the tiger is terrible and frightening.
In the next stanza the poet pictures the making of the tiger’s brain. He says that the tiger’s brain was surely made in a furnace as in the line “what the hammer, what the chain? In what furnace was thy brain?” By this the poet is actually trying to tell us that the brain, [which is a delicate organ] of the tiger is so hard that it could only be made in a place like the furnace through which he associates the tiger with heat and power. He asks about the tools which were good enough to be used on such an unyielding object and the table as in “anvil” which was good and dense enough for such a piece to be placed on and shaped. The tiger’s brain is said to be hard because he is filled with violent thoughts and so the creator ponders upon the hammer which must have been used to mend it having placed it on an anvil. Then the poet ponders about the daring hands of the creator which actually held on to the brain while it was being given its shape.
In the second last stanza of the poem, the poet talks about the reaction of the rest of the universe [the positive forces] to the creation and introduction of such a being and the reaction of the creator himself. The stars and the lamb are used to represent all the positive things in the world where as the tiger symbolizes all the negativities. The stars have realized that by the creation of the tiger, violence, cruelty, destruction, bloodshed along with danger has been let loose in the universe and harm the innocent. The poet feels that the stars, as an act of surrender threw down their spears, acknowledging defeat to a superior force, the tiger. They must have watered heaven with their tears of grief. Then the poet wonders about the creator and what he must have acted like after having created a perfect destructor. He wonders if the creator had smiled at his creation and whether he was satisfied for surely he had not made one such ferocious being by accident as in the line “did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the lamb make thee?” the poet projects a sense of bafflement, amazed at how the same creator who had already created the good [lamb] be pleased at all.
The last stanza is a repetition of the first stanza which would be necessary to complete the symmetry of the poem as the poem reflects the theme of dichotomy in the structure of the poem as well. The only difference is that the word “could” is replaced with the word “dare”. This is because the mystery of how the tiger was made has been solved but the question now is, who has the ultimate power to actually make it
Structure and tone: The poem in a perfect and well made poem that reflects the theme of the poem which deals with dichotomy. It has stanzas of equal length with a perfect rhyme scheme of aabb. As for the dichotomy, we see that the first stanza is repeated to complete the symmetry, contrast, as in “burning bright” and “forest of the night”, and the contrast of hand and feet in the line “what dread hand and what dread feet”. The symbolism is in the representation of the tiger and the stars and lamb of the positive and negative forces respectively. The poem has a series of rhetoric questions that make you agree with the poet and the poem itself. The poem thus gives the poem a perfect structure by reflecting dichotomy throughout.