THE LABURNUM TOP

BY – TED HUGHES
TED HUGES
Ted Hughes was born on August
17, 1930, in Yorkshire, England. He
published his first book, The Hawk
in the Rain
 ABOUT THE STORY

• A laburnum or "golden chain" tree is a deciduous species with yellow

flowers often planted as an ornamental tree. Most parts of the tree and
its fruit are poisonous.
• A laburnum top refers to the top of such a tree, the part with leaves
and branches and flowers.
The poem consists of four stanzas written in free verse. In the poem, a
third-person narrator describes watching the tree in September, just as
a few of its leaves start to turn yellow. The events of the poem take
place over a period of a few minutes.

At the beginning of the poem, the tree appears empty and quiet. A
female goldfinch then returns to her nest on the tree and the narrator
can hear her chicks chirping and see the leaves moving, even when the
mother bird is hidden by the leaves.
•The narrator compares the return of the
mother to an engine starting and setting a
machine in motion.
• The mother bird then heads out to the
end of a branch and flies off and the tree
falls silent again.