Woof!

This is a parody of a favourite poem of mine: 'If' by Rudyard Kipling.. And 'If' you haven't read it already, what are you waiting for?!  http://allpoetry.com/poem/8445295-If....-by-Rudyard_Kipling


Woof!

If you can hold your bark when all men about you

Are losing their mind and taking it out on you

If you can wag your tail when all men spurn you

Yet make allowance for their spurning too

If you can wait, and not be tired by waiting

As long as it takes for your master’s return

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating

Just keep on licking in the hope they’ll learn

If you can listen to the sorrows of your master

Nor judge him, but be his constant friend

If you can save him from hurt and disaster

Nor expect a reward or the favour returned

If you can bear to hear the harsh words spoken

To you for every deed misunderstood

Or watch your precious horde of old bones broken

Nor bite them back or speak a word

If you can leap or send a ball spinning

And run for every stick pitched out

And catching it, run back to the beginning

Restart the game, nor tire out

If you can force you heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your master long after they are gone

And so hold on when there’s nothing in you

Except his voice, which tells you, “Hold On”

If you can live in streets, nor lose your virtue

Or walk with humans nor lose the canine touch

If neither sticks nor stones can hurt you

Yet a master’s unkind glance prove too much

If you can chase a car every other minute

For sixty blocks worth of distance run

Yours is the Earth, and all smells in it

And-which is more- you’ll be a Dog my pup!