Ballad of Birmingham

Content Warning: Images in “The Children’s Crusade: Birmingham—1963” depict violence against children and other disturbing imagery.

“What Shall I Tell My Children Who Are Black? (Reflections of an African-American Mother)” by Margaret Burroughs (1963)

Like the mother in “Ballad of Birmingham,” the speaker in Burroughs’s poem is committed to keeping her child safe. In “Ballad of Birmingham,” the mother worries over immediate threats to her child’s safety if the child protests. The mother in Burroughs’s poem is more concerned about the corrosive influence of racism on her children’s identities; she acts by educating her children about their past, while the mother in “Ballad of Birmingham” seeks to insulate her daughter, with tragic results.

“The Last Quatrain of the Ballad of Emmett Till” by Gwendolyn Brooks (1960)

Like Randall, Gwendolyn Brooks relies on historical allusion—in this case, the lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till—to examine the impact of racial violence on mothers and their children. Where Randall hews to the traditional ballad form, Brooks relies on vivid imagery to paint a realistic picture of what life is like after the death of the child. The contrasts between the two poems help highlight the strong storytelling elements Randall uses to recount popular Black history.