Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) (1073 page)

    Tyr thought hard till he hammered our a plan,
      For he knew it was not right
    (And it is not right) that The Beast should master Man;
      So he went to the Children of the Night.
    He begged a Magic Knife of their make for our sake.
      When he begged for the Knife they said:
    “The price of the Knife you would buy is an eye!”
      And that was the price he paid.

        
Tell it to the Barrows of the Dead — run ahead!
            Shout it so the Women’s Side can hear!
          This is the Buyer of the Blade — be afraid!
            This is the great god Tyr!

    Our women and our little ones may walk on the Chalk,
      As  far as we can see them and beyond,
    We shall not be anxious for our sheep when we keep
      Tally at the shearing-pond.
    We can eat with both our elbows on our knees, if we please,
      We can sleep after meals in the sun,
    For Shepherd-of-the-Twilight is dismayed at the Blade,
      Feet-in-the-Night  have  run!
    Dog-without-a-Master goes away (Hai, Tyr, aie!),
      Devil-in-the-Dusk has run!

    Then:
        
Room for his shadow on the grass-let it pass!
            To left and to right — stand clear!
         This is the Buyer of the Blade — be afraid!
            This is the great god Tyr!

The Song of the Old Guard

Army Reform-.After Boer war “The Army of a Dream”-Traffics and Discoveries.
Know this, my brethren, Heaven is clear
  And all the clouds are gone —
The Proper Sort shall flourish now,
  Good times are coming on” —
The evil that was threatened late
  To all of our degree
Hath passed in discord and debate,
  And,
Hey then up go we!

A common people strove in vain
   To shame us unto toil,
But they are spent and we remain,
  And we shall share the spoil
According to our several needs
  As Beauty shall decree,
As Age ordains or Birth concedes,
  And,
Hey then up go we!

And they that with accursed zeal
  Our Service would amend,
Shall own the odds and come to heel
  Ere worse befall their end:
For though no naked word be wrote
  Yet plainly shall they see
What pinneth Orders on their coat,
  And,
Hey then up go we!

Our doorways that, in time of fear,
  We opened overwide
Shall softly close from year to year
  Till all be purified;
For though no fluttering fan be heard      .
  Nor chaff be seen to flee —
The Lord shall winnow the Lord’s Preferred —
  And,
Hey then up go we!

Our altars which the heathen brake
  Shall rankly smoke anew,
And anise, mint and cummin take
  Their dread and sovereign due,
Whereby the buttons of our trade
  Shall soon restored be
With curious work in gilt and braid,
  And,
Hey then up go we!

Then come, my brethren, and prepare
  The candlesticks and bells,
The scarlet, brass, and badger’s hair
  Wherein our Honour dwells,
And straitly fence  and strictly keep
  The Ark’s integrity
Till Armageddon break our sleep  .  .  .
 And,
Hey then go we!

Song of the Red War-Boat

(A.D.  683 )
“The Conversion  of  St. Wilfrid” — Rewards and Fairies

Shove off from the wharf-edge! Steady!
Watch for a smooth! Give way!
If she feels the lop already
She’ll stand on her head in the bay.
It’s ebb — it’s dusk — it’s blowing —
The shoals are a mile of white,
But  ( snatch her along! )  we’re going
To find our master to-night.

For we hold that in all disaster
Of shipwreck, storm, or sword,
A Man must stand by his Master
When once he has pledged his word.

Raging seas have we rowed in
But we seldom saw them thus,
Our master is angry with Odin —
Odin is angry with us!
Heavy odds have we taken,
But never before such odds.
The Gods know they are forsaken.
We must risk the wrath of the Gods!

Over the crest she flies from,
Into its hollow she drops,
Cringes and clears her eyes from
The wind-torn breaker-tops,
Ere out on the shrieking shoulder
Of a hill-high surge she drives.
Meet her! Meet her and hold her!
Pull for your scoundrel lives!

The thunder below and clamor
The harm that they mean to do!
There goes Thor’s own Hammer
Cracking the dark in two!
Close! But the blow has missed her,
Here comes the wind of the blow!
Row or the squall’Il twist her
Broadside on to it! — Row!

Heark’ee, Thor of the Thunder!
We are not here for a jest —
For wager, warfare, or plunder,
Or to put your power to test.
This work is none of our wishing —
We would house at home if we might —
But our master is wrecked out fishing.
We go to find him to-night.

For we hold that in all disaster —
As the Gods Themselves have said —
A Man must stand by his Master
Till one of the two is dead.

That is our way of thinking,
Now you can do as you will,
While we try to save her from sinking
And hold her head to it still.
Bale her and keep her moving,
Or she’ll break her back in the trough.  .  .  .
Who said the weather’s improving,
Or the swells are taking off?

Sodden, and chafed and aching,
Gone in the loins and knees —
No matter — the day is breaking,
And there’s far less weight to the seas!
Up mast, and finish baling —
In oar, and out with mead —
The rest will be two-reef sailing.  .  .  .
That was a night indeed!

But we hold it in all disaster
(And faith, we have found it true!)
If only you stand by your Master,
The Gods will stand by you!

The Song of Seven Cities

         
“The Vortex” — A Diversity  of Creatures

I was Lord of Cities very sumptuously builded.
Seven roaring Cities paid me tribute from far.
Ivory their outposts were — the guardrooms of them gilded,
And garrisoned with Amazons invincible in war.

All the world went softly when it walked before my Cities —
Neither King nor Army vexed my peoples at their toil.
Never horse nor chariot irked or overbore my Cities.
Never Mob nor Ruler questioned whence they drew their spoil.

Banded, mailed and arrogant from sunrise unto sunset,
Singing while they sacked it, they possessed the land at large.
Yet when men would rob them, they resisted, they made onset
And   pierced the smoke of battle with a thousand-sabred charge.

So they warred and trafficked only yesterday, my Cities.
To-day there is no mark or mound of where my Cities stood.
For the River rose at midnight and it washed away my Cities.
They are evened with Atlantis and the towns before the Flood.

Rain on rain-gorged channels raised the -water-levels round them,
Freshet backed on freshet swelled and swept their world from
         sight;
Till the  emboldened  floods  linked  arms  and,  flashing  forward,
    droned them —
Drowned my Seven Cities and their peoples in one night!

Low among the alders lie their derelict foundations,
The beams wherein they trusted and the  plinths whereon they
        built —
 My rulers and their treasure and their unborn populations,
 Dead, destroyed, aborted, and defiled with mud and silt!

The Daughters of the Palace whom they cherished in my Cities,
My silver-tongued Princesses, and the promise of their May —
Their  bridegrooms  of  the  June-tide-all  have  perished  in  my
             Cities,
  With the harsh envenomed virgins that can neither love nor play.

  I was Lord of Cities — I will build anew my Cities,
  Seven  set on rocks, above the wrath of any flood.
  Nor will I rest from search till I have filled anew my Cities
  With peoples undefeated of the dark, enduring blood.

  To the sound of trumpets shall their seed restore my Cities,
  Wealthy and well-weaponed, that once more may I behold
  All the world go softly when it walks before my Cities,
  And the horses and the chariots fleeing from them as of old!

Songs of Seventy Horses

“The Miracle of Saint Jubanus”
From “Limits and Renewals” (1932)
Once again the Steamer at Calais — the tackles
Easing the car-trays on to the quay. Release her!
Sign-refill, and let me away with my horses.
(Seventy Thundering Horses!)
Slow through the traffic, my horses! It is enough — it is France!

Whether the throat-closing brick-fields by Lille, or her paves
Endlessly ending in rain between beet and tobacco;
Or that wind we shave by — the brutal North-Easter,
Rasping the newly dunged Somme.
(Into your collars, my horses!) It is enough — it is France!

Whether the dappled Argonne, the cloud-shadows packing
Either horizon with ghosts; or exquisite, carven
Villages hewn from the cliff, the torrents behind them
Feeding their never-quenched lights.
(Look to your footing, my horses!) It is enough — it is France!

Whether that gale where Biscay jammed in the corner
Herds and heads her seas at the Landes, but defeated
Bellowing smokes along Spain, till the uttermost headlands
Make themselves dance in the mist.
(Breathe-breathe deeply, my horses!) It is enough — it is France!

Whether the broken, honey-hued, honey-combed limestone,
Cream under white-hot sun; the rosemary bee-bloom
Sleepily noisy at noon and, somewhere to Southward,
Sleepily noisy, the Sea.
(Yes it is warm here, my horses!) It is enough — it is France!

Whether the Massif in Spring, the multiplied lacets
Hampered by slips or drifts; the gentians, under
Turbaned snow, pushing up the heavens of Summer
Though the stark moors lie black.
(Neigh through the icicled tunnels: — “It is enough — it is France!”)

The Song of the Sons

One from the ends of the earth — gifts at an open door —
Treason has much, but we, Mother, thy sons have more!
From the whine of a dying man, from the snarl of a wolf-pack freed,
Turn, and the world is thine.  Mother, be proud of thy seed!
Count, are we feeble or few?  Hear, is our speech so rude?
Look, are we poor in the land?  Judge, are we men of The Blood?

Those that have stayed at thy knees, Mother, go call them in —
We that were bred overseas wait and would speak with our kin.
Not in the dark do we fight — haggle and flout and gibe;
Selling our love for a price, loaning our hearts for a bribe.
Gifts have we only to-day — Love without promise or fee —
Hear, for thy children speak, from the uttermost parts of the sea!

A Song of Travel

Canadian
Where’s the lamp that Hero lit
  Once to call Leander home?
Equal Time hath shovelled it
  ‘Neath the wrack of Greece and Rome.
Neither wait we any more
That worn sail which Argo bore.

Dust and dust of ashes close
  All the Vestal Virgin’s care;
And the oldest altar shows
  But an older darkness there.
Age-encamped Oblivion
Tenteth every light that shone.

Yet shall we, for Suns that die,
  Wall our wanderings from desire?
Or, because the Moon is high,
  Scorn to use a nearer fire?
Lest some envious Pharaoh stir,
Make our lives our sepulcher?

Nay! Though Time with petty Fate
  Prison us and Emperors,
By our Arts do we create
  That which Time himself devours —
Such machines as well may run
‘Gainst the Horses of the Sun.

When we would a new abode,
  Space, our tyrant King no more,
Lays the long lance of the road
  At our feet and flees before,
Breathless, ere we overwhelm,
To submit a further realm!

A Song of the White Men

                  1899

Now, this is the cup the White Men drink
    When they go to right a wrong,
And that is the cup of the old world’s hate —
      Cruel and strained and strong.
We have drunk that cup — and a bitter, bitter cup —
      And tossed the dregs away.
But well for the world when the White Men drink
      To the dawn of the White Man’s day!

Now, this is the road that the White Men tread
     When they go to clean a land —
Iron underfoot and levin overhead
     And the deep on either hand.
We have trod that road — and a wet and windy road —
     Our chosen star for guide.
Oh, well for the world when the White Men tread
     Their highway side by side!