By Don Tschirhart
Kipling’s lessons recalled
Someone once told me that we learn something from everyone we meet.
I would like to think this extends beyond human acquaintances, but also to those we get to know in the pages of books.
I thought it a good time to look back at authors whose works have helped me along in this life.
One author in particular stands out — the 19th century English poet Rudyard Kipling — whose poetry demonstrated what 17th century English poet John Donne had written: “No man is an island, entire of itself.”
We may have read Kipling decades ago, but something I saw a few weeks ago reminded me of something I read years before.
A magazine story mentioned Gunga Din. My mind filled with memories of the exciting poem I read in school and the great movie made in the 1940s.
“Oh my gosh, Don. A name that meant so much,” I said to myself.
I began my quest at the Ruth Hughes Library in Imlay City where one of my favorite people, Theresa, works and soon located the book of stories and poems by Kipling for me.
She made copies of his poem, Gunga Din. The poem has to be read aloud so I headed for the quiet room to read it.
The words in typical 19th century cockney English tell the story of a British army soldier in India and a regimental “bhisti,” Gunga Din. A “bhisti” was a Hindu carrier of a goatskin water bag who followed troops on marches and into battle.
Although treated worse than the lowest animal, Gunga Din always had a smile on his face. He seemed happiest when soldiers cursed him and pushed him aside.
“He was ‘Din! Din! Din! You limping lump o’ brick-dust, Gunga Din!
“Hi! slipper hitherao!
“Water! Get it! Panee lao! (bring swiftly.) You squidgy-nosed old idol, Gunga Din.”
Din follows the troops into battle dodging bullets during an attack, giving droplets of water to the wounded and holding hands and tending to the dying.
With ammunition running low, the soldier telling the tale said you could hear, “Hi! ammunition-mules an’ Gunga Din!”
The taleteller said one night he lay wounded with a bullet in the stomach. The first at his side was “our good old grinnin’, gruntin’ Gunga Din” who tended his wounds.
“An’ ‘e guv me ‘arf-a-pint o’ water-green: It was crawlin; and it stunk.
“But of all the drinks I’ve drunk, I’m gratefullest to one from Gunga Din.”
The poem’s ending is dramatic. After Din carries the storyteller to safety “a bullet come an’ drilled the beggar (Din) clean.
“E put me safe inside,
“An’ just before ‘e died; ‘I hope you liked your drink,’ sez Gunga Din.”
The soldier’s final words praise Din:
“Yes, Din! Din! Din! You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din!
“Though I’ve belted you and flayed you, By the living Gawd that made you,
“You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.”
This last phrase reminded me of another man two millenniums ago who gave all he had and obviously was “a better man than I am.”
The way my mind works one thought leads to another and this one turned to another poem, one I was forced by grade-school teachers to memorize. It was called “If.”
Again, back to Theresa at the Imlay City library and her trusty computer. Within seconds she stood up and declared, “I got it. And guess what? It was also written by Rudyard Kipling.”
Wow! Kipling did it again.
“If” is a poem that should be read out loud to grade-school children and repeated every year in high school so that its inspirational words be remembered throughout life.
The poem is too long to put into this column, but a few examples:
“If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you.
“If you can dream — and not make dreams your master; If you can think — and not make thoughts your aim;
“If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with kings — nor lose the common touch.
“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!”
Readers who wish to see the entire poem can log on to www.davidpbrown.co.uk/poetry/rudyard-kipling.html .
Print it, frame it, hang it on the wall.
Note from David T: My wife, Sue, who did not have the pleasure of meeting dad, printed and framed the poem, “If”, as a Christmas gift to me, when we were just dating. It’s beautifully matted and framed, with two windows. One showing part of the story you just read with a picture of Dad, and the other has the poem “If”, by Rudyard Kipling. The hanging is the centerpiece of my “Wall of Shame . . . I mean Fame”, “Rogue’s Gallery”, “Family Pictures” display. I married a wonderful woman!
Thanks for reading,
David T
