A Work Of Artifice

The subject of the poem is artifice: an act of deliberate and clever deception. Such a description of the practice of bonsai is unusual, since bonsai is often described as an art or a craft. Unlike these nouns, which are associated with creativity, productivity, and skill, “artifice” has a negative connotation. But who is being deceived? As the poem progresses, it becomes clear that not only is the bonsai tree created using artifice, it is also the tree that is being tricked. Thus, the bonsai tree is subjected to artifice in multiple and insidious ways.

Though the poem opens with seemingly straightforward narration, the title prefigures themes of deception and oppression. The narrator describes the bonsai tree as being grown in an “attractive” (Line 2) pot, which draws attention to the importance of aesthetic appeal. The image of the small tree in the beautiful pot is contrasted with that of a wild tree on the mountainside. The two contradictory images—the tiny ornamental tree in a pot in a domestic space and a wild tree riven by lightning during a storm on the mountainside—present two possible fates. The implicit question here is which fate is better? The narrator seems to answer this question when they say, “But a gardener/ carefully pruned it” (Lines 6-7) The connector “but” implies that the gardener’s care saved the tree from danger and death.