“An’ I’ll get a swig in Hell from Gunga Din!”
Kipling.
GREEN crawling slime, that bubbles clotted blood;
White wraiths of fetid steam that rise and curl,
And blood-red mist, convolving in a swirl
Of lurid heat, o’er that putrescent flood;
And under all, a seething, rotting mud—
Torn souls that once were men—flayed, bleeding souls,
Souls drenched with gore from gangrenous bullet-holes,
Green, sightless eyes—and blood, and blood, and blood!
Lo! Gunga Din! He cometh smeared with gore
That dribbles from cleft forehead to the skin
Of putrid drink, one black foot on Hell’s shore,
One in the slime. A flayed hand toward him grasps,
And one blind, shattered head that bleeds for sin
Bloats forth its purple tongue in strangling gasps.