The Laburnum Top
by Ted Hughes
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The poem describes a laburnum tree, still and silent in the yellow afternoon of September, its leaves turning yellow and its seeds already fallen. Suddenly the stillness is broken by the arrival of a goldfinch, the mother bird, who flies to the tree with a 'twitching chirrup' to feed her chicks hidden in its branches. The whole tree comes alive, it 'trembles and thrills', filled with the chirping and movement of the young birds, becoming a machine of energy and life. Having fed her young, the goldfinch flies off again towards the wide, open sky, and the tree returns to its former stillness and silence, 'emptied'. The poem beautifully captures the way a single living creature can transform a silent, lifeless tree into a place of throbbing energy, celebrating the vitality and interdependence of nature.
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The silent, still tree
The poem opens with the laburnum tree standing silent and still in the yellow afternoon of September. Its leaves are turning yellow and its seeds have already fallen. Everything is quiet and lifeless, only a single leaf moves. The scene is one of stillness and the approach of autumn.
The goldfinch brings life
The stillness is suddenly broken by the arrival of the goldfinch, the mother bird, who comes with a 'twitching chirrup' and enters the tree to feed her young hidden among its branches. At once the tree 'trembles and thrills'; it comes alive with a 'sudden sleek head', the chirping of the chicks and a flurry of movement, becoming, in the poet's image, a throbbing 'engine' of life.
The tree emptied again
Having fed her chicks, the goldfinch flies away again, out towards the wide, open sky ('the infinite'). As she leaves, the tree is 'emptied' of its sudden energy and returns to its earlier stillness and silence. The poem thus captures a brief, vivid burst of life within an otherwise motionless natural scene.