The wind is with me and with the cottonwoods
equally it is a race that we both want to win,
and my titanium frame flies as I pedal, but those
seedy puff balls with their white cellulose filaments
tickle my nose as they blow past, whispering
“We are strawberries” or something like that,
anything but the tiny seeds they really are who
like me rejoice exaggeratingly at losing the bonds
of earth—gravity and mowing the lawn—for awhile
but when all is said and done and the race is run
we both find a place to peg our tents and hope
there is water (and electricity and hot showers)
for there we rut.
I arrive at my campsite and set up my tent. I zip
it up tight so it won’t fill up with cottonwood Pappis.
“Do not try to germinate on my tent floor,”
I say softly.
“But we’re a bubble bath,” they exclaim.
