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1865–1936

The Deep-sea Cables.

Rudyard Kipling

The wrecks dissolve above us; their dust drops down from afar — Down to the dark, to the utter dark, where the blind white sea-snakes are. There is no sound, no echo of sound, in the deserts of the deep, Or the great gray level plains of ooze where the shell-burred cables creep.

Here in the womb of the world — here on the tie-ribs of earth Words, and the words of men, flicker and flutter and beat — Warning, sorrow and gain, salutation and mirth — For a Power troubles the Still that has neither voice nor feet.

They have wakened the timeless Things; they have killed their father Time; Joining hands in the gloom, a league from the last of the sun. Hush! Men talk to-day o'er the waste of the ultimate slime,

And a new Word runs between: whispering, “Let us be one!”

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The Deep-sea Cables. · Rudyard Kipling · Poetry Cove