The mother worries that it is too dangerous for her child on the streets of Birmingham.
When her child asks if she can go, her mother says, " you may not go,
/For the dogs are fierce and wild,
/And clubs and hoses, guns and jails
/Aren’t good for a little child." The mother is worried that the child could get hurt in the protests. She sends her daughter to church instead since it is typically thought to be a safe sanctuary. Unfortunately the church is bombed and the daughter dies.
