Poem of the Week - 'Gunga Din' by Rudyard Kipling

Hi there. As a new contributor to this blog (broken in, as it were, by Steam/real-life friend Comrade_Bazarov) I thought that my first action should be to compose an entry in its most reliable segment, the intermittent Poem of the Week, and make my addition to this misleading sobriquet. In doing so I will doubtlessly earn your Internet trust.

Like many poems that matter, at least to me, this one comes with a story. Maybe several stories.  I bought the anthology of Kipling's collected verse, a fairly cheap, commonplace edition, at an upscale establishment called the Last Bookstore in downtown Los Angeles, buying the Kipling, a collection of Shaw's plays, and the Barenaked Ladies album Gordon as spoken-word artists performed in the building's central enclosure (pretentious, like all spoken-word/slam poetry, but not unentertaining at times - and who am I to scoff at the notion that people might want to hear the stream-of-consciousness detritus of a stranger's brain) while enjoying an odd excursion out with my ex-girlfriend of the time. It was in a weird moment where we were transitioning explicitly out of relationship mode and into friendship, and not cleanly. Snappishness on both sides.

The anthology sat on my end table, as I took one or two poems a night before going to sleep. But, as you might not know, Kipling was horrendously prolific, and I slowed several hundred pages into the 700-page behemoth. That's what happens with writing on a set schedule.

Anyway, in one of the darker moments of my life, I didn't pass my first oral examination, and the possibility of that happening became apparent mid-exam. I'd been reading "Gunga Din" off and on while studying, trying to commit it to memory, and as I waited in the hallway, interminably, as I waited for my committee's decision, knowing that it lay in great doubt, being nervous and in great despair, I recited the poem to myself as a tool to eat time and ward off anxiety.

Several months later, waiting in that hallway again, during a much shorter wait, I recited the poem correctly, end-to-end, for the first time.

GUNGA DIN

You may talk o' gin and beer
When you're quartered safe out 'ere
And you're sent in penny-fights and Aldershot it;
But when it comes to slaughter
You will do your work on water
An' you'll lick the bloomin' boots of 'im that's got it.
Now in Injia's sunny clime
Where I used to spend my time
A'servin' of 'er Majesty the Queen,
Of all them blackfaced crew
The finest man I knew
Was our regimental bhisti, Gunga Din.
     He was "Din! Din! Din!
  You limpin' lump o' brick-dust, Gunga Din!
     "Hi, slippy hitherao!
     Water, get it! Panee lao,
  You squidgy-nosed old idol, Gunga Din."

The uniform 'e wore
Was nothing much before
An' rather less than 'alf of that behind.
For a piece o' twisty rag
An' a goatskin water-bag
Was all the field equipment 'e could find.
When the sweatin' troop-train lay
In a sidin' through the day,
Where the 'eat would make your bloomin' eyebrows crawl,
We shouted "Harry by!"
Till our throats were bricky-dry,
Then we wopped 'im 'cause 'e couldn't serve us all. 
     It was "Din! Din! Din!
  You 'eathen, where the mischief 'ave you been?
     You put some juldee in it,
     Or I'll marrow you this minute
  If you don't fill up my helmet, Gunga Din!"

'E would do t an' carry one
Till the longest day was done;
An' 'e didn't seem to know the use o' fear.
If we charged or broke or cut,
You could bet your bloomin' nut,
'E'd be waitin' fifty paces right flank rear.
With 'is mussick on his back,
'E would skip with our attack,
An' watch us till the bugles made "Retire",
An' for all 'is dirty 'ide
'E was white, clear white, inside
When 'e went to tend the wounded under fire.
     It was "Din! Din! Din!
With the bullets kickin' dust-spots on the green.
     When the cartridges ran out,
     You could here the front-ranks shout,
"Hi, ammunition-mules an' Gunga Din!"

I shan't forgit the night
When I dropped behind the fight
With a bullet where my belt-plate should 'a' been.
I was chokin' mad with thirst
An' the man that spied me first
Was our good old grinnin', gruntin' Gunga Din.
'E lifted up my 'ead,
An' he plugged me where I bled,
An' 'e guv me 'arf-a-pint o' water green.
It was crawlin' an' it stunk,
But of all the drinks I've drunk,
I'm gratefullest to one from Gunga Din.
     It was "Din! Din! Din!
  'Ere's a beggar with a bullet through 'is spleen;
    'E's chawing on the ground,
    an' 'e's kickin' all around,
  For Fawd's sake git the water, Gunga Din!"

'E carried me away,
To where a dooli lay,
An' a bullet come an' drilled the beggar clean.
'E put me safe inside,
An' just before 'e died,
"I 'ope you liked your drink," sez Gunga Din.
So I'll meet 'im later on,
At the place where 'e is gone-
Where it's always double drill and no canteen.
'E'll be squattin' on the coals,
Givin' drink to poor damned souls,
An' I'll get a swig in hell from Gunga Din!
      Yes, Din! Din! Din!
  You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din!
     Though I've belted you and flayed you,
     By the livin' Gawd that made you,
  You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din!

Poem of the week - 'Digging' by Seamus Heaney

Seamus Heaney, perhaps the most important Irish poet after Yeats, passed away recently. Heaney won the literature nobel prize in 1995. His translation of the Old English epic 'Beowulf' was widely lauded. I hadn't read any of his poetry until recently, when a friend of the blog emailed me this gem. Thought I would share it here.

Here's Seamus Heaney with the beautiful, gritty 'Digging':

Digging
by Seamus Heaney

Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests; snug as a gun.

Under my window, a clean rasping sound
When the spade sinks into gravelly ground:
My father, digging. I look down

Till his straining rump among the flowerbeds
Bends low, comes up twenty years away
Stooping in rhythm through potato drills
Where he was digging.

The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft
Against the inside knee was levered firmly.
He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep
To scatter new potatoes that we picked,
Loving their cool hardness in our hands.

By God, the old man could handle a spade.
Just like his old man.

My grandfather cut more turf in a day
Than any other man on Toner’s bog.
Once I carried him milk in a bottle
Corked sloppily with paper. He straightened up
To drink it, then fell to right away
Nicking and slicing neatly, heaving sods
Over his shoulder, going down and down
For the good turf. Digging.

The cold smell of potato mould, the squelch and slap
Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edge
Through living roots awaken in my head.
But I’ve no spade to follow men like them.

Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests.
I’ll dig with it.

Poem of the week - "Alley cat love song" by Dana Gioia

This somewhat irregularly recurring segment on this blog has proven moderately popular with outside readers who stumble here through google. I try to keep things fresh by posting poems across various genres, time periods, themes and genders. Haven't really posted any poems in a while, so consider this the triumphant return of this durable segment.

This is an interesting poem for me because I kinda know the son of the poet. He played quizbowl (aka academic competition etc etc) at Harvard and I have met him at a few tournaments here and there. He is widely considered one of the best players of literature questions in the country. Genetics, I suppose.

Anyway, here's Dana Gioia (who was the chairman of National Endowment of Arts, a marketing executive who avidly promoted Jello-O among other things) with his beautiful poem about love among cats:

Alley cat love song
by Dana Gioia 

Come into the garden, Fred,
For the neighborhood tabby is gone.
Come into the garden, Fred.
I have nothing but my flea collar on,
And the scent of catnip has gone to my head.
I'll wait by the screen door till dawn.
The fireflies court in the sweetgum tree.
The nightjar calls from the pine,
And she seems to say in her rhapsody,
"Oh, mustard-brown Fred, be mine!"
The full moon lights my whiskers afire,
And the fur goes erect on my spine.
I hear the frogs in the muddy lake
Croaking from shore to shore.
They've one swift season to soothe their ache.
In autumn they sing no more.
So ignore me now, and you'll hear my meow
As I scratch all night at the door.

Poem of the week - "Snake" by D.H. Lawrence

D.H. Lawrence might be better known for scandalizing the western world by penning a couple novels in the twenties that defied the cultural mores of the day - "Women in Love" and "Sons and Lovers". But the following poem shows he is a damn fine poet too.

Here's Lawrence with the "Snake":

Poem of the week - "Ring out, wild bells" by Tennyson

In spirit of the Christmas/New Year season, here's a classic by Alfred "call me Lord" Tennyson. A tender piece of work that is still widely read this time of the year. Enjoy.

Poem of the week - "I heard a fly buzz when I died" by Dickinson

Emily Dickinson, much revered today, was considered an oddball back in her time. She wrote without much care for such niceties as punctuation, capitalization and rhyming scheme. She was a very prolific poet, but only a mere handful of her poems were published during her lifetime. After her death the poetry world was blessed with the discovery of a trove of her unpublished work, nearly couple thousand poems.

Here's one of her most famous works. I love the sombre tone and the morbid nature of it.

I heard a fly buzz when I died;

The stillness round my form
Was like the stillness in the air

Between the heaves of storm.

The eyes beside had wrung them dry,

And breaths were gathering sure
For that last onset, when the king

Be witnessed in his power.

I willed my keepsakes, signed away

What portion of me I
Could make assignable,-and then

There interposed a fly,

With blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz,

Between the light and me;
And then the windows failed, and then

I could not see to see.

Poem of the week - "The secret sits" by Robert Frost

Not really a complete poem, more of a couplet. A friend sent it to me last week after we discussed some poetry in the gym while benching.

Here's Robert Frost:

The secret sits

We dance round in a ring and suppose, 

But the Secret sits in the middle and knows

 

Poem of the week - "Squattings" by Rimbaud

Continuing our theme of volatile, passionate and brilliant poets, today's installment is courtesy of the French poet Arthur Rimbaud. I managed to snag an excellent used copy of his poems for just three dollars at the local bookstore recently. Rimbaud personifies young rebelliousness. Most teenagers/young adults will pout at needless social conventions or the forceful but irrational rule of authority and will stop once they hit adulthood. Rimbaud took to poetry. By age 20, he was dazzling those around him with his irreverence, boldness and arrogance. He died of cancer at just 37.

Following is one of his "milder" poems. I love his long, deliberative approach to the central act.

Here's "Squattings":

Poem of the week - "A Cloud in Trousers" by Mayakovsky

Vladimir Mayakovsky was a firebrand Russian poet who flourished in the early decades of the 20th century. A passionate and no-nonsense poet (he despised the idea of using flowery language), he was widely popular outside of the newly formed USSR, and toured extensively in the US, France, Germany and Britain.

Like many brilliant but volatile literary figures Mayakovsky suffered bouts of depression and agitation. He shot himself at 37.

"Cloud in Trousers" is a long poem that earned him widespread recognition. Here's the prologue from that poem. Mayakovsky's assertiveness and brash confidence can be seen clearly in many verses:

Poem of the week - "Ulysses" by Lord Tennyson

Lord Tennyson patented the art of writing melodramatic poems depicting acts of great stoicism and valor. The same sombre tone permeates most of his poems. A sunny day's readings they are not - but then again, I prefer overcast skies over sunny skies anyway. Here Tennyson has taken the age old story of Odysseus (or Ulysses, if you have something against using Greek names) and made it into a manifesto of the worn but undefeated spirit. The speaker talks about suffering a lot and is in a nostalgic mood, but doesn't let any of this hamper his indomitable mind. Despite all his struggles, he is restless. He sees glory in seeking and striving for eternity. A bit long, but well worth the read.

Ulysses

It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Matched with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel; I will drink
life to the lees. All times I have enjoyed
Greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those
that loved me, and alone; on shore, and when
Through scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vexed the dim sea. I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known---cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honored of them all---
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.

I am part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough
Gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades
Forever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end.
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
As though to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains; but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

This is my son, my own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the scepter and the isle---
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfill
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and through soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centered in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.


There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail;
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toiled, and wrought, and thought with me---
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads---you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honor and his toil.

Death closes all; but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks;
The long day wanes; the slow moon climbs; the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends.
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
the sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be that we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Though much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are---
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Poem of the week - "Something" by George Harrison

Thought I would do something different this week. Obviously this is not a poem in the traditional sense, but the beauty of poetry lies in the difficulty of defining what exactly counts as poetry. I am normally ruthlessly dismissive of sappy and hokey love songs, but the simple lyrics are pretty powerful.

Here's George Harrison with "Something":

Something in the way she moves
Attracts me like no other lover
Something in the way she woos me

I don't want to leave her now
You know I believe and how

Somewhere in her smile she knows
That I don't need no other lover
Something in her style that shows me

I don't want to leave her now
You know I believe and how

You're asking me will my love grow
I don't know, I don't know
You stick around now it may show
I don't know, I don't know

Something in the way she knows
And all i have to do is think of her
Something in the things she shows me

I don't want to leave her now
You know I believe and how

And here's a clip of this mesmerizing song:

Poem of the week - "One day a Woman"

This week's feature brought to you by Miller Williams who, wikipedia tells me, is from Arkansas and is known for reading a poem at Bill Clinton's inauguration.

One Day A Woman

One day a woman picking peaches in Georgia
lost her hold on the earth and began to rise.
She grabbed limbs but leaves stripped off in her hands.
Some children saw her before she disappeared
into the white cloud, her limbs thrashing.
The children were disbelieved. The disappearance
was filed away with those of other women
who fell into bad hands and were soon forgotten.
Six months later a half-naked man in Kansas
working on the roof of the Methodist Church
was seen by half a dozen well-known
and highly respected citizens to move
directly upward, his tarbrush waving,
until he shrank away to a point and vanished.
Nobody who knew about the first event
knew of the second, so no connection was made.
The tarbrush fell to earth somewhere in Missouri
unnoticed among a herd of Guernsey cows.

Pretty surrealist. Would fit perfectly in a movie trailer about supernatural happenings. 

Poem of the week - "Kyrie"

Haven't done one of these in a while. Here's Tomas Transtromer (I have written about him here and here) again:

Kyrie:

At times my life suddenly opens its eyes in the dark.
A feeling of masses of people pushing blindly
through the streets, excitedly, toward some miracle,
while I remain here and no one sees me.

It is like the child who falls asleep in terror
listening to the heavy thumps of his heart.
For a long, long time till morning puts his light in the locks
and the doors of darkness open.

Short, uneasy and bleak: just the way I like most of my poetry. 

Poem of the week - "Face to face" by Transtromer

I blogged about the genius that is Tomas Tronstromer once before. My classmate has lent me a collection of his poems and I have been gorging on some good TT. Here's one that caught my eye.

Face to face

In February living stood still.

The birds flew unwillingly and the soul

chafed against the landscape as a boat

chafes against the pier it lies moored to.

The trees stood with their backs turned towards me.

The deep snow was measured with dead straws.

The footprints grew old out on the crust.

Under a tarpaulin language pined.

One day something came to the window.

Work was dropped, I looked up.

The colors flared. Everything turned round.

The earth and I sprang towards each other.


So simple and beautiful. Love the line "Under a tarpaulin language pined".

Poem of the week - "Ozymandias" by Shelley

Today we march into the land of familiarity. Most everyone has encountered this masterful sonnet written by a 26-year old Percy Shelley. Just because a poem has become high-school of Poetry 101 staple does not dilute its importance or its beauty. So sit back and enjoy the ride that is "Ozymandias":

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away. 

Poem of the week - "Knowledge" by Philip Memmer

I had not heard of Philip Memmer before this poem. A friend posted this poem on facebook, and I really liked it. Don't have anything more to add since I don't know much about Memmer or his style.

Knowledge


My philosopher friend is explaining again
that the bottle of well-chilled beer in my hand
might not be a bottle of beer,
that the trickle of bottle-sweat cooling in my palm
might not be wet, might not be cool,
that in fact it’s impossible ever to know
if I’m holding a bottle at all.
I try to follow his logic, flipping the steaks
that are almost certainly hissing
over the bed of coals – coals I’d swear
were black at first, then gray, then red –
coals we could spread out and walk on
and why not, I ask, since we’ll never be sure
if our feet burn, if our soles
blister and peel, if our faithlessness
is any better or worse a tool
than the firewalker’s can-do extreme.
Exactly, he smiles. Behind the fence
the moon rises, or seems to.
Have another. Whatever else is true,
the coals feel hotter than ever
as the darkness begins to do
what darkness does. Another what? I ask.

Poem of the week - "Wires" by Philip Larkin

Taking a break from Borges this week. Philip Larkin was a British poet and a somewhat morose, dude. Most of his poems deal with issues like getting old, forgetting things, and other such tragedies of life. Larkin didn't publish much in his lifetime and his entire production of poetry has been published as a slim book.

Without further ado here is "Wires":

The widest prairies have electric fences,

 For though old cattle know they must not stray

 Young steers are always scenting purer water

 Not here but anywhere. Beyond the wires

 Leads them to blunder up against the wires

 Whose muscles-shredding violence gives no quarter.

 Young steers become old cattle from that day,

 Electric limits to their widest senses.

Short, jarring ("muscles-shredding violence"), and downright gloomy. Just the way I like I poetry.

Poem of the week - "Things"

I swear this is the last Borges poem for a while. I am going back to St. Louis on Monday and should start reading some other poetry pretty soon.

Things

My walking-stick, small change, key-ring,

The docile lock and the belated

Notes my few days left will grant

No time to read, the cards, the table,

A book, in its pages, that pressed

Violet, the leavings of an afternoon

Doubtless unforgettable, forgotten,

The reddened mirror facing to the west

Where burns illusory dawn. Many things,

Files, sills, atlases, wine-glasses, nails,

Which serve us, like unspeaking slaves,

So blind and so mysteriously secret!

They’ll long outlast our oblivion;

And never know that we are gone.

The phrase "unspeaking slaves" is eye-catching. Simple and lucid poem. Made me pause and think for a few moments at the end. 

Poem of the week: "Remorse" by Borges

It's time for another edition of Poem of the Week. I have been reading some more poems by Borges, and have realized two things:

1. The man writes about very somber, depressing stuff

2. He's a damn fine poet

Here's "Remorse":