If by Rudyard Kipling

As a little background, "If" was written in 1895 - two years before the birth of the Kipling's son, John, in 1897. It appears not so much to be a code designed for a son as much as a tribute to Leander Starr Jameson - who at least according to Wikipedia had a rigid code of honour and was much loved by his contemporaries. Anyway, if by radical and reformist, people mean Jameson was seriously anti-slavery then I will forgive Rudyard his all to apparent sexism (he is,after all, a product of his time), and also celebrate the good doctor/politician.

If, by Rudyard Kipling

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 on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe 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! 

A woman's answer to "The Vampire by Felicia Blake

A Woman's Answer to "The Vampire"

Verses by Felicia Blake. (With Apologies to Kipling)

A fool there was, and she lowered her pride (Even as you and I)

To a bunch of conceit in a masculine hide ---

We saw the faults that could not be denied,

But the fool saw only his manly side (Even as you and I)

Oh the love she laid on her own heart's grave

With the care of her head and hand,

Belongs to the man who did not know

(And now she knows that he never could know)

And did not understand.

A fool there was and her best she gave (Even as you and I.)

Of noble thoughts, of gay and grave

(And all were accepted as due to the knave)

But the fool would never her folly save (Even as you and I.)

Oh the stabs she had, which the Lord forbid

Had ever been really planned.

She took from the man who didn't know why

(And now she knows he never knew why)

And did not understand.

The fool was loved while the game was new (Even as you and I.)

And when it was played, she took her cue

(Plodding along as most of us do)

Trying to keep his faults from view (Even as you and I.)

And it isn't the ache of the heart, or its break

That stings like a white-hot brand ---

It's the learning to know she raised a god

And bent her head to kiss the rod

For one who could not understand.


I think this is my favourite, but there are a few others lurking around the internet including "THE VAMPIRE'S ANSWER" but Felicia Blake's A Woman's Answer has used Kipling's original form so nicely and irreverantly that it really is a treat :)

cheers,
A.J.

A.J. Ponder's books are available through Rona Gallery, Amazon, Paper Plus and good Wellington bookstores.