In just three short lines, the speaker describes starting a new job in an office, and the job is hatred. "Paid to hate" is a startling phrase, because hate is usually something we feel on our own, not something we're hired to do. Here it becomes a duty, as ordinary as any other post in a bureaucracy. The title, "Imperial Official," suggests the speaker works for an empire, so the hatred seems to serve the state.
The speaker doesn't sound reluctant. "I am full / of sword and torch" suggests someone filled up with violence, as if the weapons have become part of their body. Those images, a blade and a fire, belong to conquest and burning, yet they sit inside an office, which makes the contrast chilling. The mood is cold and unsettling. Nothing is shouted; the speaker states it flatly, as though this were normal. That calm is what disturbs us: the poem hints at how easily cruelty can become a job.