Towards the end of "Sonny's Blues", Baldwin describes the narrator spotting a glass sitting on Sonny’s piano. He says it's shaking “like the very cup of trembling.” This symbol represents the complicated position Sonny was in. The cup of trembling is borrowed from the Bible, where it is used to describe the suffering and fear that have troubled people. The passage promises a relief from his hard times. So Sonny drinking from the cup of trembling is a reminder of all the suffering he has gone through (his drug addiction, arrest, etc.) and having the chance for peace and rescue. Like the figures from the Bible, Sonny is moving toward salvation, but his fate is still questionable. At the end of the story, no one is sure whether he will continue to suffer so he can play his music or if a greater peace and redemption waits everyone. But if the reader does refer back to the biblical allusion, Sonny will have peace in his life soon enough. Maybe even the narrator will find new hope in Sonny. He might have more trust and believe in him.
Throughout the story, the reader can tell that Sonny keeps all of his problems and emotions bottled up. He never