Poetry Corner pt.1

Rudyard Kipling,

You may know him as the writer of the "Jungle Book", "Kim" or "The Man Who Would Be King". He wrote some interesting poetry too

There is much the man & I do not have in common; Namely his imperialism and his antipathy to all things of a nationalist Irish hue but you cannot deny that this paean, written (allegedly) to his young son - John, later to die in the terrible conflict that was WWI, is simply a sublime & profound work....

"IF"

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you

But make allowance for their doubting too,

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,

If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breath a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much,

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

There is a great deal of derision amongst his fellow British poets & writers about this poem in particular, notiicably TS Elliot who dismissed him as a versifier & George Orwell who regarded him as basically a "Colonel Blimp", a prophet of Imperialism.

Read it for what it is, a series of aphorisms in verse, by happenstance, a very fine work of poetry which has endured a century now and will no doubt endure a while yet.

Simply put, enjoy it's wisdom.