Many of you know that I am a poet as well as a mountain biker, and I decided to regale you with a few poems that recount some of my mountain biking adventures over the years. I hope you have a cuppa your favorite beverage as you sit back and enjoy my tales of the wild, including an encounter with a wild cat, a Tahitian full moon, a "cliff dive" at Carrizo Gorge and a visit with ancient dinosaur tracks in Moab.
Happy holidays!
Patty

Puma at Pinyon Canyon

His puma roar sounds
like the revving of a V8 engine.
The big cat, invisible,
triggers the sprinkler system
of my skin, drenching me fast.
My heart pulses
like cop-car lights.
The desert absorbs me.
Burnt brush reaches out,
barbed claws,
hisses in the faint breeze.
The big cat, tawny as sand,
commands a high ridge,
his yellow eyes trained on me
as I strain to feel his breath
in the cold hot air.

Full Moon Tahiti

A full moon rises at dusk.
Steve and I have soared down
from Mt. Orohena on our mountain bikes
and await Tiria's vehicle
at the junction to Vaima.
That moon gives us an idea.
When we see the headlights coming,
we stand poised.
As the vehicle brakes
we yank down our pants
and bend over,
pale lunar gleaming.

It's not our pals after all.
It's a couple of Tahitians
in a red jeep,
their eyes moon wide
and laughter flying free of gravity.

Ode To My Socks

That day,
they began bright
white, duck-down
fluffy, clean
athletic.

By day's end sullied
from blood streams
coursing down
gouged legs,
my cliff-dive
at Carrizo Gorge
where flying cactus leap,
true to their name.

Dinosaur Feat

Before an ocean washed over this turf
and these red rocks were shaped by wind and surf...

Before the Anasazi came and went
leaving scant traces of the time they spent...

Before the hiss-boom of uranium
and before the zoom of titanium...

When dinosaurs roamed the Earth long ago,
when everything moved so very slow...

Back in those times of green and sun and rain
big-haunched reptiles danced on soupy terrain...

One pink dawn when dinosaurs did their dance
their footprints were frozen in mud by chance...

And you can follow their rhythm before you die
in Moab where the Dinosaur Tracks lie.

Check out their moves by the space of the grooves,
the snappy beat by the heft of their feet.

Eons later there's a reverberating "THUNK!"
you can hear if you feel lucky; so do ya, punk?




Patty Mooney and her husband, Mark Schulze, via their company, New & Unique Videos, produced the first-ever mountain bike videos (“The Great Mountain Biking Video,” “Ultimate Mountain Biking,” Battle At Durango: The First-Ever World Mountain Bike Championships,” and “Full Cycle: A World Odyssey.”) These award-winning and highly-acclaimed shows from the 80’s and 90’s are now considered classics. Visit New & Unique Videos at www.NewUniqueVideos.com. Follow Patty’s blog, “A Diary Left Open” at www.adiaryleftopen.