It's always seemed clear to me that this nursery rhyme has a clear Freudian interpretation as a child's dream-censored memory of birth trauma.

Rock-a-bye baby: the child in the womb

In the tree top: the mother's body visualized as a tree, with the baby sleeping at the "top" of the trunk (legs-hips-waist)

When the wind blows: as the mother breathes

The cradle will rock: the child in the womb gently rises and falls with the mother's breath

When the bough breaks: when the mother's water breaks for childbirth

The cradle will fall,: the child will fall into the birth canal

And down will come baby: the child will be born

Cradle and all: with the placenta around it

To the predictable chuckling response that this interpretation is ridiculous, I have of course no defense.

Jon Corelis
Kent State Reconsidered as Nightmare