Broom accident victim pens poem to driver who left him ‘for dead’ on Langford Road

Robert Cobb, 61, who was born in the village, was riding his motorbike along Langford Road when he was hit by a car and was left lying in agony in a ditch.

Forty years on, Robert now wants the driver of the other vehicle to know how much the accident still affects both his physical and mental health, and crushed his dreams of becoming a firefighter.

Remembering the night, Robert said: “I was going under the A1 bridge and I was aware of some lights coming in the opposite direction.

“I remember sliding along the road knowing I’d had a bad accident and knowing I’d been hit. I remember thinking that I had lost my right arm, but I was laying on it under my back.”

Robert spent three weeks in Bedford Hospital and a further two years travelling to Ickwell for therapy to try to help his injured arm.

However, the damage to the nervous system was too great and Robert - who was a junior fireman- was left unable to use his arm and unable to continue his career.

Robert, who wants his poem to be a warning to all drivers, said: “It wasn’t just the fire service; all my friends were out finding girlfriends, whereas I was completely out of the picture, spending time in hospital.”

He has since held office jobs and has completed a degree, but admits that he never took to the role naturally.

Now retired and living in North Scarle, near Lincoln, Robert has had time to reflect, and penned the poem as a way of releasing some of the emotions he still feels.

Robert concluded: “Looking back, it wasn’t just a road accident, it wasn’t just something that took away my chances of a career.

“There are so many other things that I haven’t done or been able to do and I’m still having mental health issues. This is a sentence that I have had to live with for 40 years. More and more I have realised just how much I have lost.

“Hopefully the driver is still alive and might have a twinge of guilt about it,” he added. “Thoughtlessness and selfishness can have huge ramifications.”

Robert’s poem:

I stare up at September skies

Lying broken on the ground

You did not even stop to see

what others had just found.

You will never know you could not know

The pain I have to bear

The daily reminders of that night

Because you did not care.

Do you ever lay awake at night

And cry for what you’ve done.

Do you ever feel the pain of guilt?

And regret you chose to run

For forty years I cried at night

For the curse of daily pain

I’ve tried so hard to live my life

But the feelings still remain.

I live a life that is not me

A life I didn’t choose.

A graduate now I am you see

But still it’s me who’ll lose.

I’d trade it all at any time

For the life that I had planned.

With two strong arms a service life

And a crew in my command.

I often wonder where you are

And how your life has been

Do you hide away in shame and guilt

Or are you happy to be seen.

I do not hate although I blame

Your actions on that day

I’d never believe that a man

would act in such a way.

You took away my livelihood

You took away my dream

You took away just anything

That life would ever mean

You took away the life I had

and what I planned to be

But more than this you took away

What God had given me.

Robert Cobb