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France? We pissed off France?

Musta pulled down their underpance.

If you can make allowance for the male centric (circa 1910) closing to this otherwise wonderfully wise lump of rhyme, I think you will enjoy some perspective on the chronic floundering about in the cesspool of human foibles that seems to have been with us since the Dawn of Time!

Emmanuel Macron hasn't been in the news lately and he need some publicity - good or bad.

I remember this poem from my girlhood. I didn’t like it at all; I was completely unable to make allowance for the male centeredness. This poem was clearly not addressed to me..

I also thought, as I grew older, that it asked far too much. All kinds of things to strive for, only to inevitably let yourself down, because the Ideal Man doesn’t exist.

It also sounds horribly condescending - patronizing, if you will.
All that insistence that you must be a Man - by inference a Great Man, a Perfect Man - when in reality, the world doesn’t even need the Perfect; it needs the Good.

Sad thing is the ideal man does exist. Or at least the “good enough man”.! And he’s right here in Ken Condon.

I know… That shall get me nowhere. And I’m not talking about you Mellow… I’m talking about xy chromosome’s in general.

Here ya go:

Unvaccinated Laura Elizabeth Loomer, who is an American far-right and anti-Muslim political activist, conspiracy theorist, and internet personality, was the Republican nominee to represent Florida's 21st congressional district in the 2020 United States House of Representatives elections, losing to Democrat Lois Frankel, states that her positive COVID test proves that the vaxx doesn't work.

What?!?

An unvaxxed person, has a positive COVID test, and that is proof that vaccines don't work. THAT is conservative logic for you.

See, I don't think that's what this poem is about at all. I think Kipling was not writing an aspirational, You go gettum, Boy Scout!", cheer, it's actually insights into what is really worthwhile. Many of the lines have three parts, the first two seemingly advice on noble behavior, but the third is a humbling qualifier. The important part isn't "keeping your head", it's being aware of what is really happening. For instance right out of the gate - "If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you" - the important part is, "and blaming it on you". I have been in that situation many times, and it is extremely difficult to not react in kind, fighting and blaming, or even acting superior by trying to be above it. Seeing it for what it is, and not losing oneself in a mechanical stimulus-response feedback loop - that's a peek into enlightenment.

"If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;"
This is not aspirational advice, it is more like shared wisdom on what is truly important.

"If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:"
Not putting on an act pretending they are the same, but actually seeing and understanding it. If you can do that, it is a form of enlightenment, it's not an instruction on how to act. It's a form of consolation for when we fail. Perspective.

"If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:"
More balm for the inevitable things that happen to us that we can't control, hopefully the way my life will look to me before my death. How much did it matter? Did I learn anything from the life that happened to me? Objectivity.

I see this poem as a testament to the unsung stuff of a good life, instead of the usual list of accomplishments - wealth, security, power, a legacy... no, what is most meaningful is the awareness of life as it happens, not what life is added up to.

Loggy asterisk: