The World Demands Its Pound of Flesh

The world doesn't understand. What it doesn't understand it strives to destroy.

To ride, to put it in the wind is to breathe. To leave the key on the hook is to suffocate and die. In the wind on a ribbon of asphalt I am Free. I am Whole. I am alive.

The far horizon forever running before me shows the breadth and depth of my Freedom. The thunder on which I sit flows power into my soul.

Back there, trudging along in the sewer they call soh-sigh-uh-tee I am lost and the light is black.

Out here, head thrown back in the wind on an open road, the light is bright and pure. The taste of my liberty is sweet on my tongue. My spirits soar in their Freedom as if I rode the wings of an Eagle.

The wives, children, girlfriends, bosses, friends and acquaintances all have stood gazing at my tail lights; and the lights of riders like me... throughout our history...

They hear our words yet comprehend nothing. Their understanding does not exist and they make no effort to know or learn.

Their anger burns for us being who we are and our combined refusal to surrender our lives in submission.

That they brand us selfish, uncaring, unworthy is a false burden I will not accept...

If a person truly loves you, why would they demand that you take an action you have warned would destroy the very person they claim to love? If they love you... they back you. They do what they can to help you... even if they can't understand you. They give you what hangs a smile on your face. And that "thing" they give is not a "Thing".

There are many I do not understand. The things that drive them are foreign and beyond my understanding. But I understand THAT. I make no effort to turn them to my way. I tell them to chase THEIR dreams not mine.

Accepting a person for who they are, seems like the only reasonable way to be. But so seldom is it the way it is.

I can only ride off from it for a time.

Ride off, often enough to feed my soul and wash the grime of their disregard off my heart.

... and break the chains they never stop trying to lock onto my soul.

Grab Your Handles and Ride
Brian