Oh, Great White Czar of Russia, who hid your face and ran, <br />You’ve flung afar the grandest chance that ever came to man! <br />You might have been, and could have been—ah, think it to your shame!— <br />The Czar of all the Russias, in fact as well as name. <br /> <br />‘The Father of your People,’ your children called to you <br />To do the things to save them which only you could do. <br />Your soldiers whipped their faces—the trodden snow is red <br />With the blood of men and women; and the blood is on your head! <br /> <br />I saw in dreams a monarch, of his power all unaware, <br />Step down amongst his people from off his palace stair: <br />The Grand Dukes shrank and trembled, the traitors fled afar— <br />Through all the mighty Russias rang the order of the Czar! <br /> <br />You might have journeyed freely, wherever path is made, <br />Through all your vast dominions, alone and unafraid; <br />And, in the eyes of subjects, the cultured and the rude, <br />Have seen, instead of hatred, the tears of gratitude. <br /> <br />Oh, little Czar of Russia, a weak man and a fool, <br />At the mercy of your nobles—their prisoner and their tool— <br />Your freedom and your people’s and their love was to be won: <br />Ah, me! it would have been a deed a coward might have done. <br /> <br />Yet we who know so little might say one word for you: <br />How many in our weakness have lost our kingdoms, too! <br />And facing death and exile, when all the world seemed black, <br />How many in our after-strength have won our kingdoms back!<br /><br />Henry Lawson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-little-czar/
