Poetry · Chapter
Prayer: My Prayer for the Tsars explained
The speaker offers a prayer that condemns the Tsars as traffickers in blood, asking for them to be fettered in iron and dungeons, while beseeching strength for the long-toiling peoples and angelic protection for the pure in heart.
What happens
The speaker offers a prayer that condemns the Tsars as traffickers in blood, asking for them to be fettered in iron and dungeons, while beseeching strength for the long-toiling peoples and angelic protection for the pure in heart. For himself, the speaker asks only to love truth on earth and to have one true friend to love him.
Themes in this chapter
Social Injustice and Class
The prayer explicitly condemns the Tsars as 'traffickers in blood' and asks for their imprisonment, while calling for strength for the 'peoples toiling long' on ravaged lands, highlighting class oppression.
Faith and Hypocrisy
The speaker uses the form of a prayer to denounce the Tsars, contrasting the ideal of divine justice with the reality of their tyranny, and asks for truth and love rather than material or political gain.
Characters to notice
- Unknown
The speaker who prays for the Tsars, the peoples, the pure in heart, and for himself.
Key passages
“My prayer for the Tsars, These traffickers in blood, That Thou on them would’st put Fetters of iron, in dungeons deep.”
I pray that the Tsars, who trade in bloodshed, be bound in iron chains and thrown into deep prisons.
The speaker calls for divine punishment against the oppressive rulers.
“And for myself, Oh Lord, I ask nought else But truth on earth to love, And one true friend to love me.”
For myself, I ask only to love truth in this world and to have one genuine friend who loves me.
The speaker's personal request is humble, seeking truth and love rather than power or wealth.