among the many benefits bicycling affords:

 

• economic independence.  bicycling can be a very cheap form of travel.  you don’t have to pay for gas, registration, or car insurance

 

• a secondhand ten speed with some good new tires will take you around the world.  all you need is some lube, air and a wrench or two for maintenance.  and you get to have clouds for skin and birds for song

 

 

• biking lets you feel the holiness envelope your body.  you get to have closeness to flight, closeness to spirit.  moving so fast you barely touch the ground, you can ride home weightless in shimmering moon with the living and dead and not yet born ones under crow dreams

 

• independence from being sedentary: bicycling is good for your body because it gives you plenty of exercise and fresh air.  it makes your lungs and limbs strong and lets your heart pump at its greatest potential.  all your blood vessels expand with euphoria, releasing stress

 

• to stay warm in the winter, you still don’t need much.  cover yourself in lamb’s wool and goose down and gain the insulation of wild ones

 

 

• legal independence.  you don’t have to worry about getting pulled over by the cops.  you can go as fast as you want without fear of prosecution from the authorities

 

• you don’t have to obey traffic rules when appropriate – you can behave on your bike like a pedestrian, jumping onto bridges and sidewalks, beaches, trails and boardwalks to bypass traffic

 

 

• you can go to secret, holy places you could never get to by car

 

 

• independence from toxic culture and capitalism.  bicycling lets us travel clean, not polluting with fossil fuel emissions.  not supporting oil wars.  not making loud noise or endangering life forms through our movements.  cycling is better for our bodies and the earth, and we can often get around locally much faster by bicycle than by car.

 

*

cycling through the rolling hills i am not separate from the blowing grasses, hawks in the sky, buttes rising up.  i am so alive and connected with the land when i look around i can see the wheat breathing, the horses looking, the willows swaying, and know that i am a living part of it all—they are breathing me in as i am breathing them in.  my body, mind, and soul live in connection with the body, mind, and soul of the land i ride through every day, receptive to the spirit, colors, sounds, and daily rhythms of all

 

*

on this bike

i can go through

boulders i can move

through cars i can go

through people’s bodies

i can go through

trees i can fly without

looking i can fly

steadily without looking

lifting like a crow

without anyone

on this bike i can

rise above ditches

bounce up from potholes

ride over thick

grass into river

where light bounces

white silver

mesmerizes me in the

lick of waves