Thistles by Ted Hughes

Thistles

by Ted  Hughes

Against the rubber tongues of cows and the hoeing hands of men
Thistles spike the summer air
And crackle open under a blue-black pressure.

Every one a revengeful burst
Of resurrection, a grasped fistful
Of splintered weapons and Icelandic frost thrust up

From the underground stain of a decayed Viking.
They are like pale hair and the gutturals of dialects.
Every one manages a plume of blood.

Then they grow grey like men.
Mown down, it is a feud. Their sons appear
Stiff with weapons, fighting back over the same ground.

Glossary

Rubber tongues of cows –Soft yet persistent grazing.

Hoeing hands of men –Human agricultural labour, suggesting the struggle to control unruly natural forces.

Thistles spike the summer air – “Spike” evokes both the literal shape of thistles and their aggressive, defiant nature.

Crackle open under a blue-black pressure – Imagery of explosive growth or resistance, with “blue-black” hinting at storm clouds, tension, or repressed violence.

Resurrection – Rebirth; even after being destroyed, the thistles return, evoking persistence and cyclical violence.

Grasped fistful of splintered weapons – Describes their jagged forms as warlike, weapons held in a fist.

Icelandic frost – Coldness and ancestry; likely referencing Viking origins and the harsh northern landscapes, tying thistles to ancient violence.

Underground stain of a decayed Viking – A powerful metaphor of buried history and death, from which the thistles seem to rise. Suggests warrior heritage and blood-soaked pasts.

Pale hair and the gutturals of dialects – Compares thistle fuzz to Viking features (blond hair), and “gutturals” evokes rough, throat-based sounds in Nordic languages.

Plume of blood – Possibly refers to the plant’s sap, but likened to blood—it intensifies the image of living, fighting entities.

Mown down – A brutal image—evokes battle, massacre, and harvest.

Feud – Reinforces the idea of generational warfare, passed on like an inherited curse.

Their sons appear / Stiff with weapons – New growth is likened to armed descendants, continuing the legacy of violence—there's no peace, only cycles.

Fighting back over the same ground – Circular conflict. Suggests futility and recurrence of war, whether among plants or people.

Explanation

Stanza 1

Against the rubber tongues of cows and the hoeing hands of men
Thistles spike the summer air
And crackle open under a blue-black pressure.

In this opening stanza, Ted Hughes introduces the resilient and aggressive nature of thistles, portraying them as defiant forces of nature that resist human and animal attempts to suppress them. The “rubber tongues of cows” and the “hoeing hands of men” symbolize the continual grazing by animals and cultivation by humans—both efforts to dominate or tame the natural world. Despite this, the thistles “spike the summer air,” a vivid image that suggests they pierce or disrupt the warm, calm atmosphere with their sharp, thorny presence. The phrase “crackle open under a blue-black pressure” adds an intense, almost explosive energy, implying a stormy or brooding atmosphere that builds tension. The thistles are not passive plants; they resist, erupt, and assert their presence violently, setting the tone for the poem’s larger theme of natural and historical cycles of conflict and resurgence.

Stanza 2

Every one a revengeful burst
Of resurrection, a grasped fistful
Of splintered weapons and Icelandic frost thrust up

This stanza evokes a powerful image of violent rebirth and unresolved vengeance. Each figure or force described is likened to a “revengeful burst,” suggesting sudden, explosive energy driven by anger or a need for retribution. The resurrection mentioned is not gentle or spiritual but forceful and aggressive, symbolized by a “grasped fistful,” which implies intentional, clenched control—something seized rather than received. What is grasped are “splintered weapons and Icelandic frost,” combining the imagery of broken instruments of war with the harsh, cold elements of a northern landscape. These elements, “thrust up,” rise violently from the earth, as if the past refuses to stay buried. The stanza as a whole suggests a return of pain, trauma, or conflict, embodied in imagery of war and ice, rising with fury and purpose. It captures the sense that what was once dead or dormant now returns, not peacefully, but with the sharp edge of revenge and the chill of bitter memory.

Stanza 3

From the underground stain of a decayed Viking.
They are like pale hair and the gutturals of dialects.
Every one manages a plume of blood.

The stanza conjures a sense of haunting legacy, rooted in ancient and decaying origins. The phrase “from the underground stain of a decayed Viking” suggests that something is rising or emanating from a buried, forgotten past—perhaps literal remains or symbolic traces of a warrior culture marked by death, violence, and time’s erosion. The comparison “they are like pale hair and the gutturals of dialects” evokes ghostly remnants: “pale hair” may imply something frail and spectral, while “gutturals of dialects” references old, harsh, throat-based sounds of ancient languages, emphasizing a raw, primal connection to ancestry and speech. These rising presences, likely figurative or spiritual, are not passive—they each “manage a plume of blood,” a striking image suggesting active violence, vitality, or the ability to harm. A “plume of blood” can symbolize both nobility (as in a plume on a helmet) and injury, blending beauty and brutality. Together, the stanza paints a picture of how the buried past—linguistic, cultural, and martial—emerges in haunting, visceral forms that still wield power and violence in the present.

Stanza 4

Then they grow grey like men.
Mown down, it is a feud. Their sons appear
Stiff with weapons, fighting back over the same ground.

The stanza begins with a transformation: “Then they grow grey like men,” suggesting that these figures—perhaps warriors, ghosts, or symbols of conflict—age and wither like human beings, implying mortality and the passage of time. However, their aging does not bring peace. Instead, they are “mown down,” a phrase that evokes the brutal, indiscriminate destruction of battle, like crops harvested by a scythe. This violence is described as “a feud,” pointing to a deep-rooted, perhaps ancestral conflict—one that is not resolved but inherited. The cycle continues as “their sons appear,” now “stiff with weapons,” ready for battle. The stiffness could signify both readiness and rigidity—unquestioning obedience to inherited hatred or duty. These sons “fight back over the same ground,” emphasizing the tragic repetition of history: the same territory, the same bloodshed, the same grievances. The stanza powerfully conveys how violence perpetuates itself, passed down like a legacy, binding generations to an unending struggle that leads only to more loss.

 Critical Appreciation of "Thistles" by Ted Hughes

Ted Hughes’s poem Thistles is a powerful and tightly constructed piece that uses the image of a simple weed to evoke themes of conflict, historical continuity, and the indomitable cycle of nature. With vivid imagery and compressed language, Hughes transforms the humble thistle into a symbol of ancient vengeance, inherited violence, and inevitable resurrection.

Themes

1. Cycle of Violence and Resurrection

The poem portrays thistles as war-like figures that rise again after being destroyed. This reflects the theme of repetition of conflict across generations, much like feuds or wars that never truly end.

2. Nature vs. Human Effort

Hughes presents nature as a force that resists human control. Despite being grazed by cows or destroyed by hoes, the thistles return. This tension between man’s attempts at domination and nature’s resilience is central.

3. Historical Memory and Ancestral Legacy

Through references to “Vikings” and “Icelandic frost,” Hughes connects the present with the distant past, implying that past violence is embedded in the land, re-emerging in the form of these aggressive plants.

4. Masculinity and Warfare

The imagery is distinctly masculine and combative, with thistles likened to “splintered weapons” and “fistfuls,” suggesting male aggression, pride, and the warrior spirit.

Structure and Form

The poem consists of three unrhymed tercets (three-line stanzas) followed by a final quatrain. The lack of rhyme or regular meter gives it a harsh, irregular rhythm that mirrors the jagged subject matter of thistles and conflict. The free verse form reinforces a sense of unpredictability and natural disorder, much like the uncontrollable resurgence of the thistles themselves.

Style and Language

Hughes’s style is compressed, vivid, and violent, marked by terse syntax and dense metaphors. He frequently uses enjambment, allowing ideas to spill over lines without pause, which creates a relentless, driving momentum.

The language is striking and tactile, filled with hard consonants and guttural sounds (e.g., "crackle", "spike", "burst", "thrust") that mimic the physical toughness of the thistles and the brutal imagery they evoke.

Tone and Mood

• Tone: The tone is grim, intense, and reverent, almost mythic in its elevation of the thistles from simple weeds to ancient warriors. There is also an undercurrent of awe and fatalism, as if the speaker respects the thistles’ power even while recognizing their destructiveness.
• Mood: The mood is ominous and combative, with a sense of unease and relentless struggle. It evokes the atmosphere of a battlefield—raw, unsettled, and bound to erupt again.

Literary Devices

1. Metaphor: The thistles are persistently metaphorized as warriors—“fistful of splintered weapons,” “sons…stiff with weapons.”
2. Personification: Thistles “spike,” “crackle,” and “fight back,” granting them human-like will and purpose.
3. Alliteration: Phrases like “hoeing hands,” and “blue-black pressure,” reinforce the poem’s rhythmic harshness.
4. Imagery: Vivid sensory images like “plume of blood” and “Icelandic frost” appeal to sight, touch, and temperature, creating a chilling, martial landscape.
5. Historical Allusion: The mention of “Vikings” and “Icelandic frost” connects the natural world to a specific historical narrative of conquest and endurance.
6. Symbolism: The thistles become a symbol of cyclical revenge, generational memory, and indestructible nature.

Conclusion

Thistles is a tightly wrought, symbolically rich poem that exemplifies Ted Hughes’s fascination with the primal forces of nature and violence. Through a seemingly simple subject, Hughes conjures a mythic vision of ongoing conflict, tying together plant biology, human history, and ancestral memory. The poem's sharp diction, relentless tone, and martial imagery leave a lasting impression of nature as both ancient and ever-renewing—a world where even weeds bear weapons and carry old feuds into new seasons.