Casting Shadows
Poetry Prompt: Write a shadow poem
Me and my shadow
riding along
a country road…
enjoying the sunrise,
the sweet breezes,
while pedaling quietly
on a July morning.
One of my favorite parts of riding in the annual four-day endurance cycling event is setting out on the backroads of Ohio, farm country, in the morning on a warm summer day. If I manage an early enough wake up call, the sun is just beginning to rise too. Breezes blow over the green and golden fields of soybeans, wheat, corn, and wild flowers — the air sweet and not yet too thick with corn sweat (it’s a real thing). The sun colors the blue sky lovely shades of orange, pink, and purple and casts my shadow on the road or the farmland beside me.
It’s so quiet save for some distance chirping birds, an occasional car (who am I kidding, it’s almost always a pickup truck), and the cows mooing softly while grazing near the fence before the sun gets too high and the day too hot to be away from the shady trees. Typically I ride without music on these mornings or many other man-made sounds, not even singing the tune that starts playing in my head to the rhythm of the pedals churing and my tires slapping a beat out on the paved road.
If my legs (and backside) would allow it and my daily location were closer to these beautiful areas of my Buckeye state, I’d ride for miles and miles every single day. Alas, I’m not there or there most summers.
Instead, I save these country rides for the organized 328-mile Pan Ohio Hope Ride that not only offers me idyllic biking opportunities such as this, but provides me the safety and security of knowing there are other cyclists and volunteers near by. These friends (known and as yet unknown) ensure that if I hit a rough patch, overheat as a fair skinned female, or (too often for my clumsy self) fall, there’ll be someone not far off who can help me pick myself up, dust myself off, and ride onward — whether on two wheels or four.
And, whether speeding along or gruelingly cranking out “one more mile” before waving the white flag, I get to do it all while doing one of my other favorite things — helping neighbors from across the state and around the country in need.
The April 15th Writer’s Digest’s Poem-A-Day Challenge, write a shadow poem, immediately brought to mind the shadow photos I made during my most successful Pan Ohio Hope Ride and the feeling of those four days in July 2016. Although I participate nearly every year now, that was the year I trained the most, and so I rode the most miles of the 328-mile course.
If you enjoyed this poem and narrative, please consider a clap or round of applause.
If you’d like to learn more about the charity bike tour of Ohio or, even better, donate to my efforts, visit bit.ly/POHRLeigh. This year I’ll be doing the tour on four wheels (driving) and photographing the event, as I’m still rehabbing from back surgery this year.
