Found- a rare and forgotten slim volume Verses by one Norman Grieve privately published in 1912. A handwritten note loosely inserted in the book says that Norman William Grieve was director of the Anglo-Ceylon and General Estates Company Ltd. (12950 acres, half tea, 40% forest – the rest cocoa, coffee and cardamons.) He had interests in Mauritius and also dealt in rubber. The poems are on a variety of subjects – Canada, Golf, Marconi and this topical poem about the Italian runner Dorando Pietri. Pietri finished first in the marathon at the 1908 Summer Olympics in London but was subsequently disqualified. He became something of a hero at the time and met the Queen…
The Marathon Race
(Olympia Dorando in First but Disqualified)
“Only a Race,” you say, and yet conceive
The bitter pangs of that brave heart –
Foremost of all the runners, there in sight
The goal, then deathly weariness
And the overwhelming shout of all those watchers:
What anguish! the longed-for laurels
Almost in his grasp, and yet how distant.
O God, to my tired body give
Strength to run out the Course and gain the wreath