Poems - Morning-Song in The Jungle

Morning-Song in The Jungle

"Letting in the Jungle"
The Second Jungle-Book

ONE moment past our bodies cast

No shadow on the plain;
Now clear and black they stride our track,

And we run home again.
In morning-hush, each rock and bush

Stands hard, and high, and raw:
Then give the Call: "Good rest to all

That keep the Jungle Law!"

Now horn and pelt our peoples melt

In covert to abide;
Now, crouched and still, to cave and hill

Our Jungle Barons glide.
Now, stark and plain, Man's oxen strain,

That draw the new-yoked plough;
Now, stripped and dread, the dawn is red

Above the lit talao.

Ho! Get to lair! The sun's aflare

Behind the breathing grass:
And creaking through the young bamboo

The warning whispers pass.
By day made strange, the woods we range

With blinking eyes we scan;
While down the skies the wild duck cries:

"The Day—the Day to Man!"

The dew is dried that drenched our hide,

Or washed about our way;
And where we drank, the puddled bank

Is crisping into clay.
The traitor Dark gives up each mark

Of stretched or hooded claw:
Then hear the Call: "Good rest to all

That keep the Jungle Law!" !