I am the land of their fathers
In me the virtue stays;
I will bring back my children
After certain days.
Under their feet in the grasses
My clinging magic runs.
They shall return as strangers,
They shall remain as sons.

Scent of smoke in the evening,
Smell of rain in the night,
The hours, the days and the seasons,
Order their souls aright;

'Til I make plain the meaning
Of all my thousand years -
'Til I fill their hearts with knowledge,
While I fill their eyes with tears.
 
 

                                           -  Rudyard Kipling