Peter Chapman Poetry

Crystal Myth

While out biking the other day,
between the rights and darks,
I came upon, quite litrally there,
a slim boy with a bushy beard
fearing nothing, he appeared.

He spoke slow as we rode along,
come from Ohio to this road in Maine,
camped a week on a permit expired
and bound, just now, as our paths overtook,
for far Alabama to famous rocks
where indians once drove horses,
Horse Pens, famous he said,
and told how they corraled them.

He had everything he might need or want,
bags of things, fore and aft, a guitar too,
well snugged up, on his old bike named Traveler,
so he ought to be about this very thing, he laughed

and smiled and huffed going up a hill
that came beneath us, then said, as I caught him
he was sorry to go ahead like that, but gosh,
my head wanted to say, a day of bright leaves and chill,
so I wished him safe travels and went off to the left,
expecting he'd turn for Alabama right there, which
he did, into that clear sweet air.