Kipling, Rudyard
. Songs from Books
Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia Library
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'BEAST AND MAN IN INDIA'
They killed a child to please the Gods
In earth's young penitence,
And I have bled in that Babe's stead
Because of innocence.
I bear the sins of sinful men
That have no sin of my own,
They drive me forth to Heaven's wrath
Unpastured and alone.
I am the meat of sacrifice,
The ransom of man's guilt,
For they give my life to the altar-knife
Wherever shrine is built.
The Goat.
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Between the waving tufts of jungle-grass,
Up from the river as the twilight falls,
Across the dust-beclouded plain they pass
On to the village walls.
Great is the sword and mighty is the pen,
But greater far the labouring ploughman's blade,
For on its oxen and its husbandmen
An Empire's strength is laid.
The Oxen.
The torn boughs trailing o'er the tusks aslant,
The saplings reeling in the path he trod,
Declare his might -- our lord the Elephant,
Chief of the ways of God.
The black bulk heaving where the oxen pant,
The bowed head toiling where the guns careen,
Declare our might -- our slave the Elephant
And servant of the Queen.
The Elephant.
Dark children of the mere and marsh,
Wallow and waste and lea,
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Outcaste they wait at the village gate
With folk of low degree.
Their pasture is in no man's land.
Their food the cattle's scorn,
Their rest is mire and their desire
The thicket and the thorn.
But woe to those who break their sleep,
And woe to those who dare
To rouse the herd-bull from his keep,
The wild boar from his lair!
Pigs and Buffaloes.
The beasts are very wise,
Their mouths are clean of lies,
They talk one to the other,
Bullock to bullock's brother
Resting after their labours,
Each in stall with his neighbours.
But man with goad and whip,
Breaks up their fellowship,
Shouts in their silky ears
Filling their souls with fears.
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When he has ploughed the land,
He says: 'They understand.'
But the beasts in stall together,
Freed from the yoke and tether,
Say as the torn flanks smoke:
'Nay, 'twas the whip that spoke.'
LIFE'S HANDICAP
The doors were wide, the story saith,
Out of the night came the patient wraith.
He might not speak, and he could not stir
A hair of the Baron's minniver.
Speechless and strengthless, a shadow thin,
He roved the castle to find his kin.
And oh! 'twas a piteous sight to see
The dumb ghost follow his enemy!
The Return of Imray.
Before my spring I garnered autumn's gain,
Out of her time my field was white with grain,
The year gave up her secrets, to my woe.
Forced and deflowered each sick season lay
In mystery of increase and decay;
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I saw the sunset ere men see the day,
Who am too wise in all I should not know.
Without Benefit of Clergy.
KIM
Unto whose use the pregnant suns are poised,
With idiot moons and stars retracting stars?
Creep thou between -- thy coming's all unnoised.
Heaven hath her high, as Earth her baser, wars.
Heir to these tumults, this affright, that fray
(By Adam's, fathers', own, sin bound alway);
Peer up, draw out thy horoscope and say
Which planet mends thy threadbare fate, or mars.
MANY INVENTIONS
And if ye doubt the tale I tell,
Steer through the South Pacific swell;
Go where the branching coral hives
Unending strife of endless lives,
Where, leagued about the 'wildered boat,
The rainbow jellies fill and float;
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And, lilting where the laver lingers,
The starfish trips on all her fingers;
Where, 'neath his myriad spines ashock,
The sea-egg ripples down the rock;
An orange wonder daily guessed,
From darkness where the cuttles rest,
Moored o'er the darker deeps that hide
The blind white sea-snake and his bride
Who, drowsing, nose the long-lost ships
Let down through darkness to their lips.
A Matter of Fact.
There's a convict more in the Central Jail,
Behind the old mud wall;
There's a lifter less on the Border trail,
And the Queen's peace over all,
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Dear boys,
The Queen's peace over all!
For we must bear our leader's blame,
On us the shame will fall,
If we lift our hand from a fettered land
And the Queen's peace over all,
Dear boys,
The Queen's peace over all!
The Lost Legion.
'Less you want your toes trod off you'd better get back at once,
For the bullocks are walking two by two,
The byles are walking two by two,
And the elephants bring the guns.
Ho! Yuss!
Great -- big -- long -- black -- forty-pounder guns:
Jiggery-jolty to and fro,
Each as big as a launch in tow --
Blind -- dumb -- broad-breeched -- beggars o' battering-guns.
My Lord the Elephant.
All the world over, nursing their scars,
Sit the old fighting-men broke in the wars --
Sit the old fighting men, surly and grim
Mocking the lilt of the conquerors' hymn.
Dust of the battle o'erwhelmed them and hid.
Fame never found them for aught that they did.
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Wounded and spent to the lazar they drew,
Lining the road where the Legions roll through.
Sons of the Laurel who press to your meed,
(Worthy God's pity most -- ye who succeed!)
Ere you go triumphing, crowned, to the stars,
Pity poor fighting men, broke in the wars!
Collected.
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SONG OF THE FIFTH RIVER
When first by Eden Tree,
The Four Great Rivers ran,
To each was appointed a Man
Her Prince and Ruler to be.
But after this was ordained,
(The ancient legends tell),
There came dark Israel,
For whom no River remained.
Then He Whom the Rivers obey
Said to him: 'Fling on the ground
A handful of yellow clay,
And a Fifth Great River shall run,
Mightier than these Four,
In secret the Earth around;
And Her secret evermore,
Shall be shown to thee and thy Race.'
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So it was said and done.
And deep in the veins of Earth,
And, fed by a thousand springs
That comfort the market-place,
Or sap the power of Kings,
The Fifth Great River had birth,
Even as it was foretold --
The Secret River of Gold!
And Israel laid down
His sceptre and his crown,
To brood on that River's bank,
Where the waters flashed and sank,
And burrowed in earth and fell,
And bided a season below,
For reason that none might know,
Save only Israel.
He is Lord of the Last --
The Fifth, most wonderful, Flood.
He hears Her thunder past
And Her Song is in his blood.
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He can foresay: 'She will fall,'
For he knows which fountain dries.
Behind which desert-belt
A thousand leagues to the South.
He can foresay: 'She will rise.'
He knows what far snows melt;
Along what mountain-wall
A thousand leagues to the North.
He snuffs the coming drouth
As he snuffs the coming rain,
He knows what each will bring forths
And turns it to his gain.
A Ruler without a Throne,
A Prince without a Sword,
Israel follows his quest.
In every land a guest,
Of many lands a lord,
In no land King is he.
But the Fifth Great River keeps
The secret of Her deeps
For Israel alone,
As it was ordered to be.
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THE CHILDREN'S SONG
Land of our Birth, we pledge to thee
Our love and toil in the years to be;
When we are grown and take our place,
As men and women with our race.
Father in Heaven who lovest all,
Oh help Thy children when they call;
That they may build from age to age,
An undefilèd heritage.
Teach us to bear the yoke in youth,
With steadfastness and careful truth;
That, in our time, Thy Grace may give
The Truth whereby the Nations live.
Teach us to rule ourselves alway,
Controlled and cleanly night and day;
That we may bring, if need arise.
No maimed or worthless sacrifice.
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Teach us to look in all our ends,
On Thee for judge, and not our friends;
That we, with Thee, may walk uncowed
By fear or favour of the crowd.
Teach us the Strength that cannot seek,
By deed or thought, to hurt the weak;
That, under Thee, we may possess
Man's strength to comfort man's distress.
Teach us Delight in simple things,
And Mirth that has no bitter springs;
Forgiveness free of evil done,
And Love to all men 'neath the sun!
Land of our Birth, our faith, our pride,
For whose dear sake our fathers died;
O Motherland, we pledge to thee,
Head, heart, and hand through the years to be!
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PARADE-SONG OF THE CAMP-ANIMALS