Dream: The Bicycle Cop

[Note: The poem was seeded by a dream I had in the morning before I left Romania, at the end of three weeks in Europe.]  

 

Dream: The Bicycle Cop

 

I fail my bicycle safety test.

I get my bicycle fixed;

This time, the bicycle passes

But the police officer fails me:

He’s obtained my medical records

And an x-ray of my back

Shows too much arthritis there.

 

He says my bicycle riding days are over;

It’s too damaging to my back.

 

I’m outraged, how dare he take away

My right to ride my bike?

I fear I’ve lost another bit of me.

Maybe I’ll defy the order,

Ride my bike anyway.

 

But here’s the thing:

I don’t even own a bicycle;

I gave it to a mental health

Bicycle charity in Glasgow

Before we left Scotland.

So why does my heart break

At this loss?

 

 

As I drift in and out of sleep

In the early morning

I imagine getting a bike,

To ride around Lodi

Like the unhoused folks do.

Or maybe a three-wheeler,

Like my old English teacher,

after he retired.

 

A young Romanian student

Drives me to the airport.

She has her bicycle in the boot.

She thanks me for the words I said

Proposing a role for poetry in EFT.

I read her the first section of this dream-poem.

 

We reflect on the feeling of riding a bicycle,

Scenery sliding by,

The sense of freedom;

I say, running is like that too.

She asks if I’m planning to return to Romania.

I don’t know, I say. 

 

 

The unspoken truth is this:

Although the spirit is willing,

The knees are weak;

The hills are steep,

The bicycle passed to someone else.

I don’t know how many more

Of these trips I have in me.

 

So: When will I come this way again?

Maybe never;

There are so many places, after all.

And now I walk instead of ride my bike.

 

But the words I’ve written?

I do think, some of them at least,

Will be read here, will safely cycle

Through this and many other places.

 

I want to say to her,

Here: I leave you my words,

Hoping they will help you find

Your way forward,

Even if I come no more

This way again.

 

                      -For Oana; July 2025; Bucharest-Lodi