.................................
The Bicycle at Low Tide
.................................

As I run, I watch for
a skeletal shape, not quite a bird
browsing the tide pool,
a glint of chrome among
seaweed-glazed rocks.

I see it, the bicycle,
bent wheel wedged
in a cairn of sea stones.

Each day low tide reveals
more camouflage, a form
less metallic, more seaweed-slicked.

I find, in memory, Lake Michigan, July,
scorching sand, frigid waves.
A grown man in plaid trunks
emerges from the water,
Neptune hauling plunder:
a full-sized bed spring.

I'm not five years old now,
I should not be amused
by rubbish in the harbor,
by trash in the lake.
But still I desire the mystery stories,
the unexpected songs of misplaced things:
The exhausted lovers,
their airless bedroom,
the sag of their mattress,
the bed spring's creak--
The furtive cyclist,
the downhill run,
the low tide in darkness,
the water's hiss.

.................................
Kathleen Rogers
.................................

 
Copyright © Kathleen Rogers
January 1999

...a poem in this room by Petrina Barson...

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