"The body, like the oak, is bent and gnarled,
The shallow-rooted mind is overthrown,
When we are near the evening of the world."
---From, 'Runes for an Old Believer", by Rolfe Humphries
Facebook post: "Respect your elders!"
My mind may not be now
as nimble as once it was,
and although I might see all
with jaundiced sight, not fresh,
not new, my mood is mostly
cool and quite calm.
--- Until, that is,
some brash provocateur
begins to essay an attack,
thinking to erase the marks
my words have made and to
overwrite them with his own.
I care not very much that he
with logic may displace my niche,
nor cleverly might mock me.
But to disparage Age in dotage,
with vile invectives, is doltish,
brutish and dumbfounding.
My sweetest comfort is
to have no doubt that he
(nor others of his ilk) will
never see how ineffectual
must be this mild complaint.
Louis has a sports centre named after him,
At his local Cambridge Regional college;
He’s a C2 para-cyclist, has Cerebral Palsy,
Plus hydrocephalus, was fired by 2012.
So after these very successful Paras 2012,
Louis was tested by British cycling coaches,
Who found talent, skill and hidden strength,
Such that he became part of the GB team.
He made the 2012 Newport Internationals,
Where he won for the individuals, bronze,
Collected a team silver and he progressed,
Onto the Apeldoorn Worlds in Holland.
There he placed fifth in the team sprint,
Came seventh in the long 1km time trial,
And in the individual pursuit came tenth,
To make the Montichiari World Champs.
One gold for the team sprint, one bronze,
For the C1-C5 C2 time trial, and so in Rio
He excelled, taking the team sprint gold,
And the bronze in the C2 individual pursuit.
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