He just can't help it. Breaking into verse is the way Bob Simon instinctively reacts to everyday life, from milestones to minutiae. Now Simon, '53, MBA '59, has published Fleeting Rhyme (Poets Cornered, 2000), and it includes the poem he wrote for the University's Centennial in 1991. It seems Simon can't get Stanford out of his system, either. The former development officer and varsity track co-captain pledges that profits from the book--and from a poster featuring the Stanford poem--will fund athletic scholarships. Both are available at the Bookstore.
Centennial, the Poem
So now my alma mater Confronts her jubilee. How does she, like all grande dames, Grow old so gracefully?
I was so young at Stanford. When I went there to learn, How could I know that Stanford Kept something in return?
How could I see that Stanford Traded me for truth?
Took just a pinch of callow
And a sliver of my youth?It balanced the equation,
That Stanford swap sublime.
I badly needed growing,
And all I had was time.Today I am more seasoned
(Perhaps I am more sage.)
She, too, is growing older,
Yet Stanford does not age.Renewed by each new student
By whom her song is sung,
She stays forever Stanford--
She stays forever young.
