Halo That Would Not Light

The title used by Lucie Brock-Broido “The Halo That Would Not Light” gives the initial thought that the poem will involve something about an angel that has lost their purity. The theme surrounding a fallen angel is hinted with the word “Halo,” as it is commonly associated as a ring of light above a holy figure. “The Halo that Would Not Light” is a short poem about the progression of a child’s adventures from the time the stork, or in this piece “raptor,” drops the child in the carriage through our years of imagination, and abruptly ends with, “is done,” death or maturity.
Brock-Broido makes some darker word choices when referring to things of childhood such as “the raptor beak.” Most of us know the nursery story of a stork, symbolizing birth,

Beginning with the title Brock-Broido sets the tone as being bittersweet in that our precious moments as infants are short and at any second it can all disappear. Furthermore, her foreboding diction along with her indentations of each sentence an abandoned haunting scene especially when she mentions the “ swings [that] go back and forth with no one in them;” it’s almost as if she is describing some ghost town heaven for kids that will never be able to grow up. Then towards the end of the poem another shift in tone takes place, one that leaves the whole ordeal lingering in the mind and poses contradiction. Probably the most beautiful oxymoron, “the spectacular catastrophe of your endless childhood is done,” to describe just how quickly life can take an unexpected turn, and the tragedy of forever being stuck in childhood. Even though death is a tragedy, this shift in the poem gives us a sense of peace.
Reflecting, one can now infer from the thoughts presented that “the halo that would not light” is in fact a sad tale not on the fact that one day we will grow up, but rather on the fact that some never have the chance to do