[stylist] Your Take?

[Judith Bron]

Man's ability to record and transmit the written word is longer lasting than 
man's ability to preserve the toil of his hands.  I guess that's why we live 
in financial cycles.  One minute all that glitters is gold and then the 
price of gold screws everyone.  Judith
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joe Orozco" <jsorozco at gmail.com>
To: "'Writer's Division Mailing List'" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Thursday, January 20, 2011 9:34 AM
Subject: [stylist] Your Take?


> I'm not much of a poetry fan, and when I do read it, it has to rhyme 
> because
> I'm just basic like that.  Anyway, give this Kipling poem a read, and tell
> me your interpretation of it?--Joe
>
> The Gods of the Copybook Headings
>
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>
>
> AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
> I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
> Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
> And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.
>
> We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
> That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
> But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
> So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of
> Mankind.
>
> We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
> Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
> But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
> That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out 
> in
> Rome.
>
> With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
> They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
> They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
> So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful 
> things.
>
> When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
> They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would
> cease.
> But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
> And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
>
> On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
> (Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
> Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
> And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death."
>
> In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
> By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
> But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
> And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die."
>
> Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards
> withdrew
> And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was 
> true
> That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
> And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.
>
> As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
> There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
> That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
> And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;
>
> And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
> When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
> As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
> The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!
>
>
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