Night Bike

A polished skeleton gleams in the porch light, meshing gears rattle silver bones. He slides tubes under his legs, pivots on a straining fulcrum, knee’s unlocking a juddering thrust. He rides by night pondering a nocturnal test flight. Lights flicker as wheels turn. Head bent, he powers downhill, lamps sucking energy through metallic stems. Stringy tendons knotted to angular levers, then uphill, dynamo stuttering, counter-assaults of implacable darkness. The dim road saps, but he will not stop. He imagines he has a blueprint for a flying bike. He believes that a drawing can be bolted together by thought. He imagines an alloy so light it can be lifted intact from the page — be airborne. The boy turns for home, there is work to be done, wings to be hammered together on paper anvils.