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FOR ANYONE WHO IS EXPERIENCING A SIMILAR MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE, I HOPE THAT YOU WILL FIND THIS POEM BY RUDYARD KIPLING BOTH
A COMFORT AND AN INSPIRATION AS DID WE.
IF-
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself
when all men doubt you,
But make allowances for their doubting
too;
If you can wait and not be tired of waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream-and not make dreams your master;
If you can think-and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors
just the same;
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 wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and toss,
And
lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word
about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except
the Will which says to them: "Hold on";
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings-nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count
with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With
sixty seconds' worth of distance run-
Yours is the Earth and
everything that's in it,
And-which is more-you'll be a
Man, my son!
-Rudyard Kipling
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