15 years on: appreciating my high school literature class (2)

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A lot of the poems I learned in high school I did not appreciate at that time. As I went on in life, I realised that the poets were actually making sense! Some of them show what an ideal world could be like; some of them list down the perfect person; and some of them encourage us to improve ourselves to be the change we want in the world.

Today, I write about one of the poems I've encountered that have an idealistic air to it. While reading it, I felt like I wanted to be this person; or if not, at least be with someone who's like this. (That would just be perfect! He would never bang the door to my face no matter how angry he is).

For how can anyone keep his cool while everyone is blaming him? Or believe in himself while nobody else does? Or hear people use his words out of their proper context and make him look like a liar? I, honestly, know I wouldn't keep my cool. I'd defend myself, correct the misquotation, and cast a doubt at my decisions... Therefore, I'm still far from this ideal personality described by the poem. I wonder if there are people who are described in this poem...

This poem, written by Rudyard Kipling in 1895, feels like words of wisdom that a parent passes on to his/her child. In a way, it is similar to a proverb from the Bible: "Train a child the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it." (Prov 22: 6, NIV).

This poem is no other than If (1).


If (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 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 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!


Reference
  1. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/If—

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