Canal Rider's Tumble

Two in the morning, nice and cool

Check the gas tank, plumb brim full

Slip out the garage, hit the road

Slap down the visor, four-wheeler mode

Cruisin’ ATV down the canal bank

Rocks popping up to rattle the tank

Gun the engine, roars nice and loud

Smoke and dust belches a cloud

Jet on the gas, soar on ahead

Ignore the jerk shouting “Hey Drop Dead!”

People don’t have no sense of fun

Two in the morning’s the time to run

Dart around the palm fronds

Slapping with their wands

Silken green fingers slide o’er my leg

“We want to come with” they whisper and beg

Oak and scrub brush flash on by

Errant branches snatch at my thigh

Jealous of freedom to just run

All they desire is to join the fun

Wind in visor, raise from my face

A tad more gas, Mother Nature I’ll race

Moonlight shimmering, water glistens below

Turn left to join its eb and flow

Laughing I gun the throttle

Jerk left to avoid a bottle

Roaring of the engine only noise

Wind in my hair my best poise

Then saw something filled me with dread

Too late I noticed it there just ahead

Rope across the canal, painted pitch black

Duck instead of jump, lose more than the slack

Struck square in the chest, tumbled head over heel

Rear over teakettle, this can’t be real

Cycle went left, made a big splash

Gasping for air, I hit with a smash

Ribs taped up, gut hurts like hell

Lying in a hospital bed, ringing the bell

Should be glad it was rope and not wire

Else my wounds would be more dire

Maybe two a.m.’s not the right time

But roping the canal’s gotta be a crime

Cop said; “Don’t know who did that bit”

“But dispatch appreciates complaints having quit”