If--

Submitted by Suanne Z. Thamm

Reporter-News Analyst

December 17, 2014 4:16 p.m.

Commissioners Corbett and Pelican at their final meeting of the 2014 Fernandina Beach City Commission.

Rudyard Kipling

At the December 16, 2014 Reorganizational Meeting of the Fernandina Beach City Commission, outgoing Vice Mayor Sarah Pelican presented outgoing Commissioner Charlie Corbett with a framed copy of British Nobel laureate Rudyard Kippling's famous poem "If."  Kipling (1865-1936) wrote the poem in 1895 and allegedly claimed that his poetic inspiration for the poem was the military actions of Leander Starr Jameson, leader of the failed Jameson Raid (December 1895 – January 1896) against South Africa to overthrow the Boer Government of Paul Kruger some 15 years prior to its publication in 1910.

At Pelican's request, Mayor Boner read the poem which appears below.

If—

BY RUDYARD KIPLING

(‘Brother Square-Toes’—Rewards and Fairies)

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 impostors 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 worn-out 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!

Source: A Choice of Kipling's Verse (1943)

Editor's Note: Suanne Z. Thamm is a native of Chautauqua County, NY, who moved to Fernandina Beach from Alexandria,VA, in 1994. As a long time city resident and city watcher, she provides interesting insight into the many issues that impact our city. We are grateful for Suanne's many contributions to the Fernandina Observer.