It was the steepest hill
Ever I knew.
Named for my great, great
Grandparents,
The Lords,
She was family,
Especially when snow fell in winter.
Not only neighborhood kids,
Adults too sled her.
Such was her reputation
That we had to endure the arrival of
An occasional station wagon
Full of thrill seeking townies
With their shiny, new
Department store sleds.
She refused to don an asphalt coat
That steep she was.
Coats of gravel just pooled at her feet
So steep she was.
One sunny, summer day
Cousin Mel and I stood
High upon her summit.
His legs straddled my beloved
Three speed bike
Fully equipped with hand brakes,
Narrow rims,
And leather saddle.
I gripped the bare steel bars
Of an old wreck borrowed.
No brakes? said I.
No brakes! we shouted to seal the deal.
Even in the foolish loose life of youth
I was an all in kind of guy.
Oh we flew!
Flesh and steel as one,
We flew!
In my young life,
Not in a car,
It was the fastest I had ever moved,
……For twenty seconds.
It was pure joy,
……For twenty seconds.
Then her feet of pooled gravel
Seized my front wheel and
Shook it the way my dog Lucy
Killed garter snakes,
Seizing tails in her mouth
And whipsawing the creatures with
Shakes of her head so violent
Their heads parted bodies.
Time stopped.
I lay dead.
Is not complete cessation of breath
……Death?
At last time did return,
Kept measure of
My drumming pain.
So as well did breath return,
Shallow, weak and wanting,
Unable yet to loose a scream.
My sight returned,
First black, then grey,
Then technicolor.
I saw Mel’s face so
White with fright.
Awareness returned,
As did feeling in my
Skewed and skewered limbs,
All atingle and in tangles
In my bier of broken brambles.
Movement returned,
Mel gave me a hand,
Tugging at my body,
Helping me to stand.
It seemed to take forever,
Even working together,
To free that stupid bike.
I lifted up my t-shirt,
Pulled it free
Of blood and dirt.
Those bare steel bars
With a slash made a ****,
Ripping flesh from my chest
Clear down to my belly.
We walked.
My front wheel was as strangely twisted as
My fifth grade school teacher
Who liked to push a hand down the back of my pants.
Strolling our steel steeds homeward,
Passing neighbor’s porches,
I was seized by a sense of surreal dread.
I saw one woman press hands to her head.
One mother jumped
Clear out of her seat,
Her mouth fell gaping,
Her gossip fell silent
Down at her feet.
My own mother ran into the street,
Seized me roughly by both arms,
Panic poured stinking from her pores
Like the sweat of one gripped
In the throes of malaria.
Even I was startled by my first look in a mirror.
It was clear I entered those vines headfirst,
Encountered numerous thorns,
Which tore a multitude of cuts
All about my face and scalp,
Areas rich in capillaries whose
Only purpose seems to be to bleed,
Then maybe bleed some more.
There had been enough red rivulets
That one could be excused for thinking
I had somehow survived
An **** of bloodletting.
But dang, my belly sure hurt!
