Page:Rudyard Kipling's verse - Inclusive Edition 1885-1918.djvu/596

 578 RUDYARD KIPLING'S VERSE

"See! These Hands they pierced with nails, outside My city

wall, Show Iron Cold Iron to be master of men all:

"Wounds are for the desperate, blows are for the strong. Balm and oil for weary hearts all cut and bruised with wrong. I forgive thy treason I redeem thy fall For Iron Cold Iron must be master of men all ! "

"Crowns are for the valiant sceptres for the bold !

Thrones and powers for mighty men who dare to take and hold."

"Nay!" said the Baron, kneeling in his hall,

"But Iron Cold Iron is master of men all!

Iron out of Calvary is master of men all!"

A SONG OF KABIR

(~)H, LIGHT was the world that he weighed in his hands!

Oh, heavy the tale of his fiefs and his lands! He has gone from the guddee and put on the shroud, And departed in guise of bairagi 1 avowed!

Now the white road to Delhi is mat for his feet. The sal and the kikar 2 must guard him from heat. His home is the camp, and the waste, and the crowd He is seeking the Way as bairagi avowed!

He has looked upon Man, and his eyeballs are clear (There was One; there is One, and but One, saith Kabir); The Red Mist of Doing has thinned to a cloud He has taken the Path for bairagi avowed !

To learn and discern of his brother the clod, Of his brother the brute, and his brother the God, He has gone from the council and put on the shroud ("Can ye hear?" saith Kabir), a bairagi avowed! 1 Wandering holy man. * Wayside trees.