There should be a place you could walk to

When you’re young.

A place with hills, gauntlets for the bike with one speed (as fast as your legs can move it)
and one brake (better hope the wires don’t snap).

Hills that are narrow and paved from a time when gas was cheaper,

and are cracked and split by roots older than the lake on the next block

that was filled with buckets of some local government (can you swim to the dock?)

I learned to sail on that lake. I learned confidence on that lake.

But on those hills…

Easing off the brakes…

On those hills, I was Achilles.