Sonnet Ii ~ Fifty Seven Winters Poem by M.L. Emmett

Fifty Seven winters besieged your brow
gouging deep ruts in your beauty paddock
Quick witted armoury surrendered now
sparking like the neurons of a haddock
The Celtic black hair so thick and so strong
Now salt and peppered grey and sparsely thin
And where has that fiery tempered man gone?
My one time brave and fearless larrikin
You'd take up the cudgels, face any fight,
survive any skirmish, stoush or battle
Your banner unfurled for the good and right
But these days, nothing your cage can rattle
Arise my champion you are not too old
A thousand warm nights before you grow cold.