Poetic Tides Through Time

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 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!

                                                           Rudyard Kipling [1865-1936]

From: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/46473

Source: A Choice of Kipling's Verse (1943)

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         Day 11 - "If -"  by Rudyard Kipling, a 1907 Nobel Prize winning author, is another poem that I was required to memorize though I only recall the opening lines now. I thought, as I was troping through my poem collection, that this was quite apropos for all, considering our current political climate. I have always been impressed, too, by the quality and wisdom behind this poem to say nothing of the poetic structure. His childhood was quite challenging and it seemed that he bounced between England and America in later years.

         A complete biography can be found here: http://www.biography.com/people/rudyard-kipling-9365581#life-in-america.(/size}