The Burning Babe by Robert Southwell is a very symbolic poem about the birth and life of Jesus Christ. Southwell has an interesting biography in which he was "executed as a traitor in the usual grisly manner" for being a Roman Catholic. He was a brave soul who "minister to English Catholics" on a "dangerous mission" and was a martyr for his faith. Knowing the background of Southwell's life, makes the spirit poem better, because he truly believed in Jesus and wanted to share his faith with the world.
In his poem, he uses a lot of words such as heat, fire, scorched, flames, warm, fuel, smoke, coals, furnace, glow, and ashes, which could be a representation of hell, Jesus' warm heart, or his passion for his fellow man. He also uses tears, melt, snow, and winter to show that Jesus came into a cold world and made it warm, while using water as metaphor for his blood and baptism.
"So I will melt into a bath to wash them to my blood" is a reference to Christ being baptized by John the Baptist and his crucifixion. The line "With this he vanished out of sight and swiftly shrunk away" is a reference to how many people have forgotten Christ and often take him out of the equation when celebrating Christmas
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