Three Poems After Darrell Staggs

Dreamcycle, photography by Darrell Staggs (USA) 2016

​My Sky Blue Bike
an ekphrastic etheree
 
I
wanted
that bike more
than anything:
ice cream, a puppy.
Riding with sun shining.
Everyone watching me. ME.
On that bike. It arrived on a
Tuesday. I still remember that day.
The most beautiful thing I ever saw.
Same blue as the sky, tires like the clouds.
I rode until far into night.
Mom made me stop for dinner.
Nothing ever surpassed
memories of it.
It still shimmers
in my mind.
My blue
bike.
 
Marilyn Wolf
 
Marilyn Wolf lives in Indiana, is a member of several writing groups. In Celebration of the Death of Faeries, is her first book. Her work has been published in anthologies and INverse and displayed in physical and online galleries. She is a member of local, state, and national poetry organizations, currently an editor with The Howling Owl  and a reader for Of Rust and Glass. She is a past 1st VP of the Poetry Society of Indiana and current Director for Indiana Writers Center. A Pushcart Prize nominee. https://wolfen25.net/

**

Bicycle Dreams
 
Simple times ruled
in days gone by, when 
youngsters with bicycles 
rode dreams of adventures.
 
Racing on driveways and sidewalks, 
kids were free and dreamed of flying, 
kicking up air, and cruising down hills. 
Double-dog dares—Look, Ma, no hands!
 
The thrill of handle-bar rides and 
hanging on from behind, soaring 
through parks and playgrounds,
legs cranked on single-speed.
 
Not a care in their naive corner of 
the world, when wars dragged on with 
countless lives lost in faraway lands.
Parents struggled, shielding their 
children from life’s cruel lessons. 
 
But life on a bike distanced troubles
with wheels spinning and tire rods roaring. 
A clothes-pinned Joe DiMaggio or Yogi Berra 
slapped against spokes, mimicking motorcycles.
 
Dreams launched fearless escapades 
with homemade Evil Knievel ramps, 
hurling kids through the air 
to master skid-marked landings. 
 
Rain puddles were no match 
for the heat of spinning rubber
that shot geysers from the wheel,
and tattooed legs with mud and grit.
 
Life was simple then
for a kid with a bicycle, 
and dreams 
were made for wheelies.
 
Karen Zimmerman
 
Karen Zimmerman, a Midwesterner at heart, is a published poet and writer. Her works appear in poetry journals, anthologies, Chicken Soup for the Soul, and numerous publications. She is the director and editor for Central Indiana Writers’ Association, and proofreads for the national magazine The Pen Woman. A member of Poetry Society of Indiana and other writing groups, she writes for a Parkinson’s newsletter, and offers copywriting and editing services. Karen loves nature, is an outdoor enthusiast, dabbles in photography, arts and crafts, and adores her doggies, family, and friends. She attempts a website at www.writtenperception.com.

**
 
Broken Dreams
 
As I finish the last of the dishes that December evening
I look through the sink window.
I see a light in the barn.
I expect it is Bill bidding Duchess farewell.
 
At the bus he makes me promise to take good care of her.
He loves that horse.
In my letters to his ship in the South Pacific
I write of her trotting along the fence line
standing in the spring breeze of the orchard
galloping to the swimming hole.
I think she looks for him.
I think she remembers.
 
After Bill was gone and Pa faded away with his loss
I had to rent the farmland
sell the cow and the car.
Duchess moved to someone else’s pasture.
I see her walking the fence line as I bike into town.
I wave halloo.
I bring her carrots from the garden
and apples
until she is no longer there.
 
I bike the empty fence line
thinking of Bill riding along the field rows
stopping by the orchard
head turned into the wind
wasting the day at the swimming hole.
 
After the war
after I return the job I love to a man who came home again
before I give up the farmhouse forever
I pedal down the fence line to the swimming hole.
I think I can hear Bill yell as he swings over the water
his splash breaking apart the smooth surface
like the rippled regret of broken dreams.
 
Nancy Simmonds
 
Nancy Simmonds writes letters, postcards, and poems from northeastern IN. A member of the Poetry Society of Indiana and of NIPoets, as well as a longtime member of a university book group, when a pen isn’t in her hand or her head in a book, Nancy designs and sews scrap quilts and designs paper collage art, plans travel adventures, and runs in local Fort Wayne Running Club events as well as in virtual races for bling and bragging rights.