ADOLESCENT KINETICS

A scene I watched one day and how it unfolded.

The girl on the bicycle lifts her incipient hips

Off the seat and pedals with singular intention

Up the knoll, knowing if she does not give her all

She will have to walk the bike- a chagrin

Her twelve year old pride does not readily accept.

 

Her face is as set as a mast while the spoke beads

Slide from hub to rim, rim to hub, and her wee breasts

Bob like spar lights with the wave of the pavement.

For a moment it looks as if she’s not going to make it

The crest is a turn away and the beads are dead still

 

Then her scrawny haunches find their momentum

And her feet muscle down the stubborn pedals

Till the handlebars steady and the bike eases to a glide.

On the ridge she dares to tousle her long black strands

That stream in the wind when she sails down the backside.