Each first ride of the year I think of Big Jim,
writing his poem in a rush of memory,
even though his son would later claim
he never rode a bike but once --
no matter -- he caught the essence of the thing:
"We left by separate doors
Into the changed, other bodies
Of cars, she down Cherrrylog Road
And I to my motorcycle
Parked like the soul of the junkyard,
Restored, a bicycle fleshed
With power, and tore off
Up Highway 106, continually
Drunk with the wind in my mouth,
Twisting the handlebar for speed,
Wild to be wreckage forever."
-from "Cherrylog Road," by James L.Dickey
