Explore "The Last Lap" by Rudyard Kipling on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
How do we know, by the bank-high river, / Where the mired and sulky oxen wait, / And it looks as though we might wait for ever, / How do we know that the floods abate? / There is no change in the current's brawling- / Louder and harsher the freshet scolds; / Yet we can feel she is falling, falling, / And the more she threatens the less she holds. / Down to the drift, with no word spoken, / The wheel-chained wagons slither and slue. / Steady! The back of the worst is broken. / And-lash your leaders! -we're through-we're through!
How do we know, when the port-fog holds us / Moored and helpless, a mile from the pier, / And the week-long summer smother enfolds us- / How do we know it is going to clear? / There is no break in the blind-fold weather, / But, one and another, around the bay, / The unseen capstans clink together, / Getting ready to up and away. / A pennon whimpers-the breeze has found us- / A headsail jumps through the thinning haze. / The whole hull follows, till-broad around us- / The clean-swept ocean says: -"Go your ways!"