national poetry month: rudyard kipling
Apr. 30th, 2009 11:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bedlamsbardIt is the last day of National Poetry Month! For...about another hour CST, anyway. I was hoping to get the Narnian poetry up this month, but that's a no-go; I'm still supposed to be writing a paper as we speak.
So instead: my favorite Rudyard Kipling poem.
Also available here; I don't know how to do all the proper formatting on LJ.
Hear now the Song of the Dead—in the North by the torn berg-edges—
They that look still to the Pole, asleep by their hide-stripped sledges.
Song of the Dead in the South—in the sun by their skeleton horses,
Where the warrigal whimpers and bays through the dust of the sear river-courses.
Song of the Dead in the East—in the heat-rotted jungle hollows,
Where the dog-ape barks in the kloof—in the brake of the buffalo-wallows.
Song of the Dead in the West—in the Barrens, the waste that betrayed them,
Where the wolverine tumbles their packs from the camp and the grave-mound they made them;
Hear now the Song of the Dead!
I.
We were dreamers, dreaming greatly, in the man-stifled town;
We yearned beyond the sky-line where the strange roads go down.
Came the Whisper, came the Vision, came the Power with the Need,
Till the Soul that is not man’s soul was lent us to lead.
As the deer breaks—as the steer breaks—from the herd where they graze,
In the faith of little children we went on our ways.
Then the wood failed—then the food failed—then the last water dried—
In the faith of little children we lay down and died.
On the sand-drift—on the veldt-side—in the fern-scrub we lay,
That our sons might follow after by the bones on the way.
Follow after—follow after! We have watered the root,
And the bud has come to blossom that ripens for fruit!
Follow after—we are waiting, by the trails that we lost,
For the sounds of many footsteps, for the tread of a host.
Follow after—follow after—for the harvest is sown:
By the bones about the wayside ye shall come to your own!
When Drake went down to the Horn
And England was crowned thereby,
’Twixt seas unsailed and shores unhailed
Our Lodge—our Lodge was born
(And England was crowned thereby!)
Which never shall close again
By day nor yet by night,
While man shall take his life to stake
At risk of shoal or main
(By day nor yet by night).
But standeth even so
As now we witness here,
While men depart, of joyful heart,
Adventure for to know
(As now bear witness here!)
II.
We have fed our sea for a thousand years
And she calls us, still unfed,
Though there’s never a wave of all her waves
But marks our English dead:
We have strawed our best to the weed’s unrest,
To the shark and the sheering gull.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we ha’ paid in full!
There’s never a flood goes shoreward now
But lifts a keel we manned;
There’s never an ebb goes seaward now
But drops our dead on the sand—
But slinks our dead on the sands forlore,
From the Ducies to the Swin.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we ha’ paid it in!
We must feed our sea for a thousand years,
For that is our doom and pride,
As it was when they sailed with the Golden Hind,
Or the wreck that struck last tide—
Or the wreck that lies on the spouting reef
Where the ghastly blue-lights flare.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we ha’ bought it fair!
I know Kipling gets a lot of crap because of The White Man's Burden, but he's a gorgeous poet; probably the only other poet that comes close is T.S. Eliot, and he's gorgeous, but he's no Kipling. Kipling can be hilarious, gorgeous, and poignant. If you've never given Rudyard Kipling a chance, or if all you've read of Kipling is "The White Man's Burden" and despise him for it, please go and check out some of his other works. Both his prose and his verse is available online here; I'm going to admit that I haven't actually read most of his prose (I read the Just-So Stories when I was a kid, but it's been an age), but I love, love, love his poetry, so go ahead and check that out. For sheer beauty, go for the "Song of the English" series in The Seven Seas; Barrack-Room Ballads has the majority of his soldiering poetry ("I done my six years’ service. ’Er Majesty sez: 'Good-day— / You’ll please to come when you’re rung for, an’ ’ere’s your ’ole back-pay; / An’ fourpence a day for baccy—an’ bloomin’ gen’rous, too; / An’ now you can make your fortune—the same as your orf’cers do'"). That's a starting point. (And I don't remember which poem is about the guy who crawls into the sewers to hide from an elephant and then complains about how dirty they are! Kipling, man, Kipling.)
Rudyard Kipling: Favorite. Poet. Ever. Shortly followed by T.S. Eliot, but Kipling has Eliot beat, man.
So instead: my favorite Rudyard Kipling poem.
Also available here; I don't know how to do all the proper formatting on LJ.
Hear now the Song of the Dead—in the North by the torn berg-edges—
They that look still to the Pole, asleep by their hide-stripped sledges.
Song of the Dead in the South—in the sun by their skeleton horses,
Where the warrigal whimpers and bays through the dust of the sear river-courses.
Song of the Dead in the East—in the heat-rotted jungle hollows,
Where the dog-ape barks in the kloof—in the brake of the buffalo-wallows.
Song of the Dead in the West—in the Barrens, the waste that betrayed them,
Where the wolverine tumbles their packs from the camp and the grave-mound they made them;
Hear now the Song of the Dead!
I.
We were dreamers, dreaming greatly, in the man-stifled town;
We yearned beyond the sky-line where the strange roads go down.
Came the Whisper, came the Vision, came the Power with the Need,
Till the Soul that is not man’s soul was lent us to lead.
As the deer breaks—as the steer breaks—from the herd where they graze,
In the faith of little children we went on our ways.
Then the wood failed—then the food failed—then the last water dried—
In the faith of little children we lay down and died.
On the sand-drift—on the veldt-side—in the fern-scrub we lay,
That our sons might follow after by the bones on the way.
Follow after—follow after! We have watered the root,
And the bud has come to blossom that ripens for fruit!
Follow after—we are waiting, by the trails that we lost,
For the sounds of many footsteps, for the tread of a host.
Follow after—follow after—for the harvest is sown:
By the bones about the wayside ye shall come to your own!
When Drake went down to the Horn
And England was crowned thereby,
’Twixt seas unsailed and shores unhailed
Our Lodge—our Lodge was born
(And England was crowned thereby!)
Which never shall close again
By day nor yet by night,
While man shall take his life to stake
At risk of shoal or main
(By day nor yet by night).
But standeth even so
As now we witness here,
While men depart, of joyful heart,
Adventure for to know
(As now bear witness here!)
II.
We have fed our sea for a thousand years
And she calls us, still unfed,
Though there’s never a wave of all her waves
But marks our English dead:
We have strawed our best to the weed’s unrest,
To the shark and the sheering gull.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we ha’ paid in full!
There’s never a flood goes shoreward now
But lifts a keel we manned;
There’s never an ebb goes seaward now
But drops our dead on the sand—
But slinks our dead on the sands forlore,
From the Ducies to the Swin.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we ha’ paid it in!
We must feed our sea for a thousand years,
For that is our doom and pride,
As it was when they sailed with the Golden Hind,
Or the wreck that struck last tide—
Or the wreck that lies on the spouting reef
Where the ghastly blue-lights flare.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
Lord God, we ha’ bought it fair!
I know Kipling gets a lot of crap because of The White Man's Burden, but he's a gorgeous poet; probably the only other poet that comes close is T.S. Eliot, and he's gorgeous, but he's no Kipling. Kipling can be hilarious, gorgeous, and poignant. If you've never given Rudyard Kipling a chance, or if all you've read of Kipling is "The White Man's Burden" and despise him for it, please go and check out some of his other works. Both his prose and his verse is available online here; I'm going to admit that I haven't actually read most of his prose (I read the Just-So Stories when I was a kid, but it's been an age), but I love, love, love his poetry, so go ahead and check that out. For sheer beauty, go for the "Song of the English" series in The Seven Seas; Barrack-Room Ballads has the majority of his soldiering poetry ("I done my six years’ service. ’Er Majesty sez: 'Good-day— / You’ll please to come when you’re rung for, an’ ’ere’s your ’ole back-pay; / An’ fourpence a day for baccy—an’ bloomin’ gen’rous, too; / An’ now you can make your fortune—the same as your orf’cers do'"). That's a starting point. (And I don't remember which poem is about the guy who crawls into the sewers to hide from an elephant and then complains about how dirty they are! Kipling, man, Kipling.)
Rudyard Kipling: Favorite. Poet. Ever. Shortly followed by T.S. Eliot, but Kipling has Eliot beat, man.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-01 07:38 am (UTC)How could I have forgotten that? He's like a down comforter for your brain.
*snuggles up with poems*
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-01 05:15 pm (UTC)