Prayer Before Birth - Poem by Louis Macneice.

Prayer Before Birth - Poem by Louis Macneice  I am not yet born; O hear me.

Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the

club-footed ghoul come near me.

I am not yet born, console me.
I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me,
with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me,
on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.

I am not yet born; provide me
With water to dandle me, grass to grow for me, trees to talk
to me, sky to sing to me, birds and a white light
in the back of my mind to guide me.

I am not yet born; forgive me
For the sins that in me the world shall commit, my words
when they speak me, my thoughts when they think me,
my treason engendered by traitors beyond me,
my life when they murder by means of my
hands, my death when they live me.

I am not yet born; rehearse me
In the parts I must play and the cues I must take when
old men lecture me, bureaucrats hector me, mountains
frown at me, lovers laugh at me, the white
waves call me to folly and the desert calls
me to doom and the beggar refuses
my gift and my children curse me.

I am not yet born; O hear me,
Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is God
come near me.

I am not yet born; O fill me
With strength against those who would freeze my
humanity, would dragoon me into a lethal automaton,
would make me a cog in a machine, a thing with
one face, a thing, and against all those
who would dissipate my entirety, would
blow me like thistledown hither and
thither or hither and thither
like water held in the
hands would spill me.

Let them not make me a stone and let them not spill me.
Otherwise kill me. 

Louis Macneice

This poem is considered as dramatic monologue. it was written around the time of the second world war and as a result it has a pessimistic tone. The poet uses a voice over of the infant or it even be called foetus.

As the title of poem suggest its tone of that of request of a sort wherein the foetus in the womb does not wish to come on this earth if the conditions remain what they are. This is the premise in which the poet constructs his poem.

The first stanza has a pleading tone wherein it does not wish to enter in this earth if the world is so frightened.

“let not the bloodsucking …come near me”

Moving forward to the second stanza the tone becomes that which requires consolation in which it fears the human race and every sin that the human commit.

In the next stanza infant requires certain provisions like that of water, grass, tree, sky and birds for a jocund company.

In the next stanza forgiveness is demanded for the sins that it would commit as soon as it is born and wishes to be away from traitors who forcefully lead it towards committing mistakes.

Moving forward to the 5^th stanza ,the poet takes in to consideration the infant’s wish to get ready for robs that he/she has to play and that he wishes has to be away from

“old men lecture …children curse.”

In the 6^th stanza the infant requests that he/her should be heard and that nothing negative should come near and he/she should be saved from any negative elements within the society.

The following stanza is about infant’s wish to fill him\her with utmost strength against inhuman and that he/she should cease to be mechanic and materialistic ,and that he/she should never loose control on ones own self and wishes to be integrated in terms of deeds.

Finally the poet through the mouthpiece  of an infant does not wish to enter this world full of miseries it is better to get killed than to live in this world.

As the tone of the poem suggest it was written in a very difficult time period for entire world. World at that point in time was not worth living and it is reflected through this poem in very pessimistic way of saying and the infant is used as a mouthpiece because the world at that point in time was not at all good for procreation.