[R. S. Gwynn]

Our own John's birthday (64) is tomorrow, Friday, 12/11. I suggest we all send him appropriate poetic tributes.

[Editing in] 16 lines or less, of course.

What, still alive at 64,
A pint-mad, print-glad lad like you?
You should have gone some years before
Amongst the many, not the few.

Your habits would have slain a clan
Of hardy Scotsmen ere their time,
So now you prove you are the man
Who cheats the odds to pull for prime.

Bottles and butts lie shed behind
The trail you long since vowed to blaze,
Yet here you stand, with unspent mind
And talents that shall yet amaze.

We honor you, soon-pensioneer,
Whose lines must Brown and Labour vex,
And pray you last another year
To get in full your monthly checques!