I Like to Ride My Bicycle

I really do.

I ride it to school, to market, into town.

My bike and I go along canals, through parks, along windy streets, on bike paths.

It helps me not be so late all the time:

I am inevitably five minutes behind, which made me very late

when I had to wait for the next bus

but sometimes not late at all on my bike.

You can hardly hear my bike it runs so smoothly.

Except, of course, when I ding the bell

but that has a nice ring too.

I like riding my bike out Wednesday mornings to la Wantzenau

where I teach English and have lunch with a nice family.

I pass bus stops called “Unterjaegerhof”

(I’m convinced it’s an Alsatian insult)

And one called, literally, “Fields.”

Being on my bike

puts me real close to the blossoming

forsythia and lilacs and magnolias.

I try to breathe in as much as I can when I pass by,

but not so much that I get light-headed—

you always have to be watchful on a bike.

I’ve already given in and named it.

It’s a she.

Her name is Rembrandt,

though I don’t call her that here

(I don’t like the way it sounds in French).

There is a little French flag painted on the frame

above her name.

I like bicycles.