Saturday, October 18, 2008


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 imposters 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 wornout 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 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!


-Rudyard Kipling

2 comments:

mattbeatty said...

Awesome poem. Kipling was/is great. Also, that photo with its weird lines and curves is pretty sweet. Where is it?

GunthërBrown said...

Its the rotunda of the US Capitol Building. I took the picture almost three years ago when we went to DC for a week. Eli was like two months old, such a trooper...

I like this picture because it reminds me of an eclipse, which throws in the good ol' "ancient symbolism" card. All over Washington DC there is alot of symbolism, even in this picture there is the bundle of bamboo as part of the painting frame... I forgot what its called, and a google search only pulled up crazy conspiracy websites, no real help. Did find some cool stuff about symbols on the dollar bill, though...

Anyhow, I was proud to take this picture and bring out some more symbolism...

An eclipse is like death and rebirth, an instantaneous sunset and sunrise. Depending on your take on the half full/empty glass, this picture is catching the first moments of the sunset or the final moments of the sunrise. Right in the physical heart of our government.

Matt Beatty for president! Haha.