Ballad of Birmingham - Essay Example

Ballad of Birmingham The poem, “Ballad of Birmingham,” by Dudley Randall dramatizes the racial tensions and violence that were witnessed in the United States in 1963. The dialogue between the mother and the little girl captures the various issues that revolve around the core subject of racial violence, which swept through the American society at the time of the poem’s publication. The effective use of various stylistic devices and the words in the poem have been brought out in ways that give strong hints to the social realities that divided the white-dominated society and the African Americans (Armstring 197; Randall 143). From the first verse, the poet uses stressed and unstressed syllables in different ways in order to bring out the contradictions and conflict that was resident in the situation as presented in the poem. For instance, the words “go downtown,” (Randall 1) and “streets of Birmingham,” (Randall 3) are stressed and unstressed with the objective of creating both rhythm and emphasis. Through the rhythm created, it is possible to achieve some aspect of order in order to capture the reality of the situation. Rhythm enhances the mood of sadness that pervades the entire poem. It might be argued that the rhythm created in the poem is important in emphasizing on the themes of violence and freedom in the poem. The same kind of rhythm that is captured through the use of words could be explained by way of the regular metre that is used within the poem. It is also possible to notice the variations on the kind of stress and unstressed syllables that are used at the different points of the poem. The use of figurative language features in several lines of the poem. Words such as “guns” and “jails,” (Randal 1) as used in the different parts of the poem have their meanings stretching beyond the literal and casual sense of their usage (Boyd 254). One notable feature of this usage is that the same words are quickly followed by “a little child,” (Randal 8) in the eighth line for the purpose of achieving the desired level of contrast. On this score, it becomes appropriate to assert that the choice and sequence of the words as used in the second verse captures the way that the gruesome world of political violence existed side by side by the innocence of children and women. Apart from illustrating the ugly price of violence, the words have the effect of representing reality in vivid detail by awakening the sensibilities of the reader to the social impact of the struggle particularly with regard to its impact at the individual level (Parini 412). Also evident in the poem is the creative use of words to achieve some measure of inverted pattern of words. In the first line, the poet opts for “Mother Dear,” (Randall 1) instead of Dear Mother as often used in the conventional sense. The intended meaning, as understood from some perspective, is to emphasize and give force to the voice of the little girl. Poetically, such techniques have the power of reversing the manner in which words are used to effectively create meaning that might otherwise be lost in traditional or conventional aspect of usage. Furthermore, such usage of certain words and some forms of language enables the poet to infuse some form of poetic aesthetics in the lines and verses. In the different parts of the poem, there is a manner in which the respective parts are used to evoke different feelings. For instance the parts represented by the dialogue between the mother and the little girl are treated with some kind of exuberance. On the other hand, the verses that describe the bombing are brought out in ways in a manner that illustrates the sadness of the situation. In this poem, one of the strategies used is the choice of words. Juxtaposition, contrast and irony are used variously, to capture the differences in the world view between the opposing sides. Repetition has been used at various instances in the poem to create emphasis on the themes are used in the poem. One notable instance where repetition achieves much potency might be represented in the first line of the second verse “No Baby no, You may not go,” (Randall 5) The words “no” effectively highlight the mother’s concern for the safety of the small girl. Broadly, the repetition also serves the purpose of explaining in literary details the deep sense of concern and the fear that was always resident in the mothers of the conflict-ridden society. It explains the helplessness of women in the wake of their children’s vulnerability (Randall and Melba 143). In essence the poet seeks to highlight the kind of trauma and fear that afflicted the African American families during the high season of civil rights movements. Sometimes, the same element of repetition is utilized for the purposes of creating transitions within the poem. The points of transition are marked out through variations in the mood and tone of the poem. Variations are managed through the technical devices in order to highlight points of differences as marked out through racial differences, contrasting world views as brought out through the world of innocence and the world of experience as represented by the mother and the world of innocence as captured by the little girl. By bringing out the two worlds, the poet intends to show the multiple shades of the African American community and the various levels of suffering that affected them during the clamour for civil rights in the country. The poem recalls to memory the charged moments of the civil rights movements, which redefined the history of the United States. It might be argued rather justifiably that that the creation of dichotomies between the warring factions has been achieved significantly through the element of violence. Notably, the choice of vocabulary captures the element of tension in the sense that it tends to capture some of the salient issues that divided the world view of the small girl and the violent society. Through this the poet manages to colour the world in a somewhat sensationalized manner that highlights the needlessness of violence and the limitless potential of the violence ending or affecting the lives of innocent people within the society. Some of the defining features of the situation are that it defines the world in a manner that separates the situation that is portrayed and the stylistic devices employed by the poet to highlight the major ironies and satires of the situation. For example, the poet seeks to demonstrate that irrationality of the situation through dramatic irony. The mother prevents the little girl from going downtown, which she considers generally violent. Ironically, it turns out that the church, where she really wanted the little girl to go to was hit by the devastating explosion that tragically ended the life of the small child. The sequence of the events allows the reader to comprehend the gravity of the matter from multiple points of view. The words used to discuss the innocence of the little girl are meant to bring out the sense of innocence. The potency of these words could be noted from their capacity to herald an element of danger in the waiting. The emphasis on the sense of innocence is one of the dramatic ways in which the author seeks to prepare the reader’s sensibilities to the possibility of a disaster. There is the sense in which the choice of the poet’s words are creates some sense of a foreboding gloom. The situation is built from one verse to the next through the sequence of the dialogue. For maximum effect, the poet switches from the first person voices of the mother and the little girl to the third person omniscient narrator, where the horror of the bomb attack is captured in particularly gruesome terms. It might be argued that the poet could not have captured the exact dimensions of the tragedy without the third person point of view. Further the combination of three voices has the effect of capturing dramatic situation from various angles in order to expand the meaning of the tragedy. In general terms, it might be observed that some of the issues that are captured sufficiently rely significantly on the technical aspects of the poem. The stress on words of colour such as “dark,” (Randall 19) and “white,” (Randall 17) creates a wedge between the two diametrically opposed worlds as represented by the thematic structure of the poem. Works Cited Armstring, Julie, B. The Civil Rights Reader: American Literature from Jim Crow to Reconciliation. New York: University of Georgia Press, 2009 Boyd, Melba, J. Wrestling With the Muse: Dudley Randall and the Broadside Press. Columbia:Columbia University Press, 2003 Parini, Jay. The Wadsworth Anthology Of Poetry. London:Cengage Learning, 2005 Randall, Dudley and Melba Joyce Boyd. Roses and Revolutions: The Selected Writings of Dudley Randall. New York: Wayne State University Press, 2009 Randall, Dudley. Ballad of Birmingham. The Black Poets. 143-144 pdf Read More