The Gypsy Trail - Kipling

The Gypsy Trail

THE white moth to the closing bine,

   The bee to the opened clover,

And the gipsy blood to the gipsy blood

   Ever the wide world over.

Ever the wide world over, lass,

   Ever the trail held true,

Over the world and under the world,

   And back at the last to you.

Out of the dark of the gorgio camp,

   Out of the grime and the gray

(Morning waits at the end of the world),

   Gipsy, come away!

The wild boar to the sun-dried swamp

   The red crane to her reed,

And the Romany lass to the Romany lad,

   By the tie of a roving breed.

The pied snake to the rifted rock,

   The buck to the stony plain,

And the Romany lass to the Romany lad,

   And both to the road again.

Both to the road again, again!

   Out on a clean sea-track --

Follow the cross of the gipsy trail

   Over the world and back!

Follow the Romany patteran

    North where the blue bergs sail,

And the bows are grey with the frozen spray,

    And the masts are shod with mail.

Follow the Romany patteran

   Sheer to the Austral Light,

   Where the besom of God is the wild South wind,

   Sweeping the sea-floors white.

Follow the Romany patteran

   West to the sinking sun,

Till the junk-sails lift through the houseless drift.

   And the east and west are one.

Follow the Romany patteran

   East where the silence broods

By a purple wave on an opal beach

   In the hush of the Mahim woods.

"The wild hawk to the wind-swept sky,

   The deer to the wholesome wold,

And the heart of a man to the heart of a maid,

   As it was in the days of old."

The heart of a man to the heart of a maid --

   Light of my tents, be fleet.

Morning waits at the end of the world,

   And the world is all at our feet!

Rudyard Kipling