Last time out my heart rode in the cradle of a wire basket, in front

on an old Schwinn, a couple of broken spokes to be sure, the price

of admission or admitting the road ain’t always paved, but is mostly

intact, mostly upright, mostly leaning into the next wend in the asphalt,

the path cedar-lined, summer-cooled, close against the lake like enough

when we loved the first time, before the water and wave buckled the shore,

or the apple tree fell from age; before the yard went to weeds, your dad

went to ground, or any of the rest of what’s happened through the days

we’ve carried on, pedaling into a headwind or downwind or otherwise, refusing

to cave in, the way the limestone collapsed atop the bluffs, the beach broke

on the east side, or the neighbors dropped out, when their baskets fell off for good.