I believe the correct answer is: approaching.
In this excerpt from the poem "Learning to Read" written
by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, the meaning of the word rising is approaching.
The subject of this poem is Aunt Chloe, representing all elderly former slaves
in order to convey the value of literacy to blacks during and after slavery as
a key to freedom. Aunt Chloe wants to learn to read in order to read the Bible,
and as she was approaching sixty years, she had to “hurry”. To achieve that:
"So I got a pair of glasses,
And straight to
work I went,
And never stopped till I could read
The hymns and
Testament.
Then I got a little cabin
A place to call my
own—
And I felt independent
As the queen upon
her throne."
