[Author's Note: The title means "little father" or "dear little father", a term of endearment applied to the Tsar in Russian folk-song. --T.B.A.] <br /> <br />From yonder gilded minaret <br />Beside the steel-blue Neva set, <br />I faintly catch, from time to time, <br />The sweet, aerial midnight chime-- <br />"God save the Tsar!" <br /> <br />Above the ravelins and the moats <br />Of the white citadel it floats; <br />And men in dungeons far beneath <br />Listen, and pray, and gnash their teeth-- <br />"God save the Tsar!" <br /> <br />The soft reiterations sweep <br />Across the horrer of their sleep, <br />As if some dæmon in his glee <br />Were mocking at their misery-- <br />"God save the Tsar!" <br /> <br />In his Red Palace over there, <br />Wakeful, he needs must hear the prayer. <br />How can it drown the broken cries <br />Wrung from his children's agonies?-- <br />"God save the Tsar!" <br /> <br />Father they called him from of old-- <br />Batuschka! . . . How his heart is cold! <br />Wait till a million scourgëd men <br />Rise in their awful might, and then <br />God save the Tsar!<br /><br />Thomas Bailey Aldrich<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/batuschka/
