The Gipsy Trail

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The Gipsy Trail
by Rudyard Kipling

First published in Century Magazine, December 1892; first collected in the Inclusive Edition of Rudyard Kipling's Verse, 1919.

366495The Gipsy TrailRudyard Kipling


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!

This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.


The longest-living author of this work died in 1936, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 87 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.

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