The girl's mother dresses the child in her best clothing for her to attend the church service. The irony of the mother dressing her child in her very best is that the girl ends up wearing them for her funeral rather than church. In the fiftieth stanza, the dialogue changes from the mother to the narrator. The tone of the narrator in this stanza exhibits the pleasure and fulfillment that the child's mother takes in the little girl's appearance.
"She has combed and brushed her night-dark hair,.
And bathed rose petal sweet,.
And drawn white gloves on her small brown hands,.
And white shoes on her feet" (Randall 17-20).
When the mother brushes the little girl's dark hair, it leads the reader to have a sensation of reassurance and freshness. The mother dressed the girl in white, which is a symbol of purity. It is ironic that the mother chooses to dress the child in white, for it gives the reader a clue of what is about to occur. Another subtle irony is shown by the mother dressing her daughter in white and trying to get the girl to conform to the "Caucasians " while they are the ones who eventually kill the young girl. In the sixtieth stanza, the author states: "The mother smiled to know her child/ Was in a sacred place/ But that was the last smile " (Randall 21-23). This statement gives the reader awareness of what is about to occur. The stanza demonstrates that the girl's mother believes her child will be in the safest location, so why would this be the mother's last smile to cross her face? Randall's use of figures of speech in his poem "Ballad of Birmingham " gives it a touch of irony. In the first stanza, he uses a metaphor to give the reader a clue of the child's race by stating her need to partake in a freedom march, allowing the reader to believe she is a colored child. In the fifth stanza, he confirms the reader's suspicion of the child's skin color and sex. Repetition is used throughout the poem to convey the mother's fright for her child; in stanza two and seven: "No, baby, no, you may not go, " (Randall 5, 13).