The Works of Rudyard Kipling: One Volume Edition

LA NUIT BLANCHE

     A much-discerning Public hold
       The Singer generally sings
     And prints and sells his past for gold.

     Whatever I may here disclaim,
       The very clever folk I sing to
       Will most indubitably cling to
     Their pet delusion, just the same.

   I had seen, as the dawn was breaking
     And I staggered to my rest,
   Tari Devi softly shaking
     From the Cart Road to the crest.

   I had seen the spurs of Jakko
     Heave and quiver, swell and sink.
   Was it Earthquake or tobacco,
     Day of Doom, or Night of Drink?

   In the full, fresh fragrant morning
     I observed a camel crawl,
   Laws of gravitation scorning,
     On the ceiling and the wall;
   Then I watched a fender walking,
     And I heard grey leeches sing,
   And a red-hot monkey talking
     Did not seem the proper thing.

   Then a Creature, skinned and crimson,
     Ran about the floor and cried,
   And they said that I had the “jims” on,
     And they dosed me with bromide,
   And they locked me in my bedroom—
     Me and one wee Blood Red Mouse—
   Though I said: “To give my head room
     You had best unroof the house.”

   But my words were all unheeded,
     Though I told the grave M.D.
   That the treatment really needed
     Was a dip in open sea
   That was lapping just below me,
     Smooth as silver, white as snow,
   And it took three men to throw me
     When I found I could not go.

   Half the night I watched the Heavens
     Fizz like '81 champagne—
   Fly to sixes and to sevens,
     Wheel and thunder back again;
   And when all was peace and order
     Save one planet nailed askew,
   Much I wept because my warder
     Would not let me set it true.

   After frenzied hours of waiting,
     When the Earth and Skies were dumb,
   Pealed an awful voice dictating
     An interminable sum,
   Changing to a tangle story—
     “What she said you said I said”—
   Till the Moon arose in glory,
     And I found her... in my head;

   Then a Face came, blind and weeping,
     And It couldn't wipe its eyes,
   And It muttered I was keeping
     Back the moonlight from the skies;
   So I patted it for pity,
     But it whistled shrill with wrath,
   And a huge black Devil City
     Poured its peoples on my path.

   So I fled with steps uncertain
     On a thousand-year long race,
   But the bellying of the curtain
     Kept me always in one place;
   While the tumult rose and maddened
     To the roar of Earth on fire,
   Ere it ebbed and sank and saddened
     To a whisper tense as wire.

   In tolerable stillness
     Rose one little, little star,
   And it chuckled at my illness,
     And it mocked me from afar;
   And its brethren came and eyed me,
     Called the Universe to aid,
   Till I lay, with naught to hide me,
     'Neath the Scorn of All Things Made.

   Dun and saffron, robed and splendid,
     Broke the solemn, pitying Day,
   And I knew my pains were ended,
     And I turned and tried to pray;
   But my speech was shattered wholly,
     And I wept as children weep.

   Till the dawn-wind, softly, slowly,
     Brought to burning eyelids sleep.