Lacing Up A Wheel

Lacing up a wheel

Sounds like I am going for a walk.

I try not to get lost

Is the spoke holding the hub up

Or is the rim hanging from the hub

Sometime it is and sometimes it isn’t

Counting holes going round

First one way then the next.

The madness to find a rhythm

Impossibly confused wobble

A wheel in parts together

That can’t hold itself up

Could never roll soon

Takes shape of round

The moment of truth

For true the test

The tensing of a wheel

Ends in a hyperbolic

Paraboloid that I could never

Purposely make.

Its beautiful and wrong at the same time.

Lacing up a wheel again.

Garage Tires

Tires in garage beg for air

The bike getting dusty

Each week each glance

Dosen’t roll the wheels

Now the tire walls have mushroomed flat

My glances get fewer by guilt

The rust, dust and memories holding it in place

I will inflate the tires and roll the wheels later

Too many thoughts to get through

Only time enough to ride to work.