A Pageant of Elizabeth

Written for “The Pageant of Parliament,” 1934

Rudyard Kipling

            LIKE Princes crowned they bore them—
                Like Demi-Gods they wrought,
            When the New World lay before them
                In headlong fact and thought.
            Fate and their foemen proved them
                Above all meed of praise,
            And Gloriana loved them,
                And Shakespeare wrote them plays!

.     .     .     .     .

Now Valour, Youth, and Life’s delight break forth
    In flames of wondrous deed, and thought sublime—-
Lightly to mould new worlds or lightly loose
    Words that shall shake and shape all after-time!

Giants with giants, wits with wits engage,
    And England-England-England takes the breath
Of morning, body and soul, till the great Age
    Fulfills in one great chord:—Elizabeth!

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