Lyra Bicyclica: Sixty Poets on the Wheel

A mosaic of short quotations lifted from Horace, Cowley, Dryden, Cowper, Watts, Wordsworth, Byron, and Moore, wrenched out of context to seem to celebrate the bicycle and prefacing the collection.

An introductory verse declaring that the wheel inspires a higher strain, invoking the great poets (Poe, Moore, Byron, Emerson, Whitman, Longfellow) whose styles the book will borrow to sing the bicycle.

A cycling poem in the manner of Ralph Waldo Emerson (signed 'R.W.E. + D.') that contrasts the dead, go-less boneshaker with the lively high bicycle that raises new riders over the earth.

A 'parody-mosaic' in Emersonian transcendental style picturing wheelmen as knights on uncarnate steeds and the bicycle as a mystic, soul-lifting orbit revolving with the cosmos.

A jaunty cycling song adapted from Oliver Wendell Holmes, urging walking men to mount the new 'noble steed' and pedal away like planets spinning in the sky.

A pair of comic limerick-like stanzas about a rash young man whose hasty riding gives him a rough time and who threatens to swap his bicycle for a tricycle.

A short Latin toast (with English version) in the style of Holmes, drinking to the pioneer Boston bicycle club of 'the Hub' and wishing its circling growth well.

A poem closely after Holmes lamenting those who walk and tire while riders glide silently, calling the wheelless to rise yet a yard higher onto the bicycle.

A sonnet in the manner of Oliver Wendell Holmes ('W Oliver Endell') praising the noiseless 'alma rota' that carries the rider beyond the city's narrow bounds.

A boastful comic song (after the old refrain style) in which the proud rider extols his light, swift forty-pound mount and pities those who do not own a bicycle like his.

A Longfellow-style translation 'from Dante' in which the poet, on the coast near Boston, beholds an angelic wheel approaching over the sea bearing the herald Bisakel.

A Longfellow-flavoured song to the 'silent wheel' that lifts withering middle age and carries youthful legions of riders over boundless regions of equitation.

A short Longfellow-style lyric declaring that, though earth has gems and heaven its stars, the poet's own heart has its wheel, fairer than all.

A brief Longfellow-style dialogue in which a hurrying rider explains he holds the 'wheel of life' and flies from the city's dust and toil to the freedom of the road.

A ballad recounting how the Briton's iron steed, the bicycle, came to a quiet city, was scorned by schoolboys but praised by the wise, and soon became familiar everywhere.

A poem with 'Mr. Songfellow' (Longfellow) assisting, treating the high bicycle's steps and rolling gait as a ladder by which riders climb toward health and the heights of their time.

A poem after Longfellow likening the silent, swift high wheel to no previous steed, gliding past the gazing crowd and teaching wisdom by its noiseless transit.

A blank-verse rhapsody after Longfellow and others praising the graceful, floating gait of the cyclist and the delight of launching aloft like a new young moon rolling into the realms of road.

A Longfellow-style sonnet (parodying 'To the River Rhone') addressed to the nickel-plated Rover bicycle, hailed as a king among wheels welcomed from town to town and sea to sea.

A patriotic song in marching refrain hailing the bicycle's arrival on American shores, calling Yankee-Land's beardless cavalry to mount the bright steel wheel.

A poem 'by Senior' in which an aging rider finds that mounting the greater and lesser wheels of the high bicycle warms his heart and revives his November limbs.

A poem (with a Seneca tag) voicing the walker's mock-defiance, bidding the cyclist turn his lofty wheel while the pedestrian, secure of foot and hand, waits and watches.

A cycling parody in the manner of Tennyson (signed 'A.T. + D.') warning bystanders to keep clear of the swift, ticklish wheel and praising its fiery, light flight.

A poem 'sewly translated from Old Goeasy (Goethe)' offering the rider the motto 'without pause, without haste,' with comic cautions against croppers, teams, and tumbles.

A parody of Poe's 'Eldorado' in which an aging knight, long seeking a steed of fire, at last finds it in a bicycle and sheds his years riding upon it.

A recasting of Poe's 'Israfel' in which the angel Bisakel, whose great wing is a wheel, outflies all God's creatures and is hymned as the best and wisest of the bicycling gods.

A short hymn (signed 'J.D. + D.') hailing the coming of Bisakel, inventor of the rotal frame, whose machine raises mortals toward the skies and draws an angel down.

A song in altered notes from Thomas Moore celebrating the true wheel of rubber and steel that came over the sea and turns the same wherever it goes, bringing liberty and the open country.

A summer reverie ('In Midsummer') after Moore in which the sight of bicycles recalls youth, health, and merry past rides, with hope that the gleeful wheel will roll on.

A short cycling ode 'mo(o)re translated than ever' (after Moore's Anacreon) delighting in both the restive youth and the mellow sage who ride the wheel and keep their hearts and heels young.

A poem (by 'T.W.O.') in which a rollicking rider speeds past a fretting poetess and a wayside boy who begs the bicycle to linger, while wheel and song glide away unheeding.

A four-line epigram after Moore ('T.M. + D.') declaring that horses and asses inspire nothing nice, but the wheel is the true steed of Parnassus that carries a bard to the skies.

A poem ('Cyclus Scintillans') about a richly dressed dandy cyclist who rides safely through an Irish by-way, trusting both his bicycle's glamour and the Irish love of manly exertion.

A song 'a la Moore' praising the mounted wheel as a charmer-away of care and a giver of health, comparing wit-inspired bicycle poets to Franklin drawing fire from the clouds.

A self-referential verse in which the poet says he can write 'mobile poesy' only when astride the reliable bicycle, his lines whirling through the world with the wheel.

A short coquettish poem (by 'T.W.O.') in which a young woman admires the lively action and glittering wires of her Johnny as he rides by on wheels.

A poem after William Strode (c. 1630) finding music and jollity in the cranky wheel, whose vibrating wires make the heart-strings wake and turn grief to mirth.

A poem addressed to the wire wheel, misjudged by the walking man, celebrating how John Bull's machine lifts office-bound men from chair and stool to ride like hawks and pigeons.

A short comic squib in which 'Young Sixty' visits the wheel-shop and meets a friend, prompting the speaker 'Forty' to quicken his own pace as the other boys do.

A battle-hymn (by 'T.W.O.') of bicycling 'bloods' going forth to win Hygeia's crown, celebrating the chosen Boston club of twelve who bowed their necks to mount the wheel.

A parody of 'Home, Sweet Home' (made 'more moving') insisting there is no seat like the wheel and begging for the high bright bicycle and the fleet pace of leg above all else.

A poem in which the speaker, whose native youth moved only on lowly feet, finds that lame age caught him until he vaulted into the saddle of the wheel, with a 'What to Do' coda urging the sad to try the bicycle.

A poem 'By Sir Frightful Plagiary, taken from Miss Alice Carey' exulting in a first ride as earth's tiresome ills recede, ending with a note that the rider came a nasty cropper and returned by rail.

A poem made from William Knox's 'Mortality' (twice as true and half as long) asking why the spirit should be proud, picturing the rider sweeping from town on his bicycle while the boneshaker is erased from memory.

A hymn of praise to Bisakel, the 'Prince of Pace,' whose steely beams make his wheels shine, with captive bards bidden to sound his praises and strew roses round his sliding throne.

A dramatic ballad (by 'T.W.O.', after Sydney Dobell) in which a mother questions a passing cyclist about her boy John, learning at last that he rode too fast and came a nasty cropper.

A song (with the motto 'Dum vivimus volvamus') in which an elderly rider praises the living wheel that quickens him, claims it has stretched him from five feet six to five feet ten, and resolves to steer a safe 'Xtraordinary.'

A short poem declaring the big bicycle the fittest horse for a man, outmatching famous racehorses for jollity, with a comic 'Currente Bicyclo' tag on a leggy young clubman.

A brief comic sketch of the 'up-atop-of-the-wheel' young man, a cavalry-club spinner and spurter prone to falling in the dirt, more leggy than army.

A poem (signed 'Juvenis') vowing he would sooner give up Spring, flowers, and the toper's horn than surrender Rota and its rolling praise from his heart, save when penned indoors in midwinter.

A poem 'By Sir Walter Rolly' (after Raleigh) asking only for his bicycle of quiet, his health-horse to walk upon, his hose and breeches, to take his pilgrimage and meet fellow riders on the road.

A short poem calling the bicycle the sun of the stable, with riders as planets that roll and shine by his borrowed light as he goes round.

A hymn-parody 'by Augustus Mountagentop Wheely' in which the rider clings to the cross-frame of the English wheel, asking it to teach him its speed and power and carry him down unknown hills with a trusty brake.

A short hymn (with the tag 'Beati possidentes') rejoicing in the happiness of those who ride high on the whirling rim, leaving the earth to be upheld and blest by the wheel.

A brief pensive lyric (signed 's.A.D.') urging the young to ride the wing-fed wheel while they may, since Old Time flies fast and the gay youth of today may lie dying tomorrow.

A 'Wordsworthy variation by a Rydal Bard' parodying Wordsworth's 'She was a Phantom of delight,' celebrating the bicycle as a lovely apparition, a being breathing though no breath, of forty pounds of pure delight.

A Wordsworth-style sonnet 'by Two Rydal Bards' in which a salesman, weighing price against worth, offers lofty spinning wheels that launch the rider aloft over hills and dells.

A poem (with the tag 'Lux ecce surgit ferrea') of swift bright heralds standing on bicycles in John's high name, calling the land to glad riding and bidding climbing souls catch Health upon the fly.

A parody of 'My Country, 'Tis of Thee' (by 'Smith et al.') hailing the bicycle (or tricycle) as a merry car of levity, with the band singing to Bisakel, angel of wheelery and great pedal king.

A poem (signed 'J.D. + D.') chiding grave walkers for creeping along while young wheel-stalkers rise, urging the elders to mount and rise too, since the wheel is a care-beguiling ride that befits their years.

A short verse (signed 'J.D. + D.') reproaching a middle-aged man for failing before the height, urging him not to follow his dull forefathers' bad example but to ride fast and gay through the year.

A poem ('Habitus Bicyclicus') with the refrain 'Bicycle high with the slippery seat,' tracing the rider's bachelor, married, and wintry seasons and finding the wheel a fit companion and 'help-meet' through all.

An ode of 'the trying 'cycler to his wheel' begging the rotal bird to end the strain of climbing and toppling and to start him languid into life, until the whistle of fellow cyclists steels his sinews for the ride.

A sentimental love-poem 'by Prof. Highwell' in which the rider praises his bicycle as a peerless beloved, a blessing John made noiseless as the snow, with a comic 'A Header' coda about going over a stone.

A lyric 'Beaumount & Fleetcher' (after Beaumont and Fletcher) inviting the wheel to rock the rider in delight and beguile his cares with pleasing roads, a skeleton a-gliding that brings life to man or boy.

A descriptive piece 'by Lord Boyrun' (after Byron) explaining the bicycle for those who have not seen one, an uncovered car steered at the front, ridden by a single rider who glides crackly along like a witch on a broom.

A two-part poem 'by Lord Boyrun' (after Byron) praising rides as holidays brighter than hiring horses, hailing the many-twinkling-spoked bicycle as a phoenix and volant miracle no longer a boneshaker.

Two sonnets by 'Wheeliam Shakespoke' (after Shakespeare's sonnets) urging an aging man to climb the high bicycle and resume his strong youth, warning that one who keeps low cannot look to rise.

Two sonnets by 'Wheeliam Shakespoke' (after Shakespeare) in which the poet explains why his verse is so full of levity and quick range, confessing he yokes great poets to spin old song new in praise of the wheel.

Two sonnets by 'Wheeliam Shakespoke' (after Shakespeare) addressing Bisakel as the poet's muse and 'tenth Muse,' who lends wires to the poets' strings and grace to the dual wheelery, with a Shakespeare-style epigram against breaking one's bones.

A poem 'see the Venus and Adonis' (after Shakespeare) admiring how the artisan's bicycle surpasses the living horse in shape, endurance, pace, and lightness, with riders ranging far and racing like tempest weather.

A poem ('writer been taking something') sketching the bicycler as a knightly figure of heart and hardiness, well dressed and disdainful of inferior horses, welcomed and applauded by the clubmen when he vaults to his seat.

A poem after Thomas Campbell ('What's Hallowed Ground'/'distance lends enchantment') asking why the cycling eye turns to the misty upland, answering that distance lends enchantment to the mounted rider's view.

A short comic poem in which young Rollo, riding a wheel and singing of the Flyer, invites a mute middle-aged man to come higher, who turns away like an indolent brute saying he'll not go up.

A poem recalling the joy of the first rides after learning, when wheeling gave life a new edge, and proclaiming the bicycle the best equitation, fit to roll on forever like the waves of the sea.

A poem (Boston, May 30, 1881) calling walkers to the wheelmen's annual meet and telling how bicyclic riding began in heaven, rolled down to the island kingdom of Britain, then crossed the sea to the Yankee League A.W. throng.

A short lyric in which the rider, his courting and married days gone, finds that the wheel's soundless quick whirl restores his youth and his laughter, ranging antic and boundless.

A poem ('olden style') in which the speaker rejects coach and cart for the quiet steel wheel, on which he skims the plain and climbs the hill, laughing at those who trade their health for golden gain.

A sonnet after Elizabeth Barrett Browning in which the rider, hammering out the music of his wheeling on keys of thought, declares to the plodders the true onwardness he feels riding alone up in the air.

A roundel after Swinburne in which the bicycle is wrought as a ring of the starry sphere, its silent music rewritten of love, worship, or woe by a mocking-bard's fun-fancy.

A roundel after Swinburne addressed to one shut indoors and tied to ease or ail, asking whether he hears the fine wheels plying outside and the hale riders passing on silence astride, and whether he will keep peeping rather than try the joy.

A roundel after Swinburne asking the wheel to show some roadster where the rider's soul can be serene, preferring a meek tricycle or a safety two, free from the dread of getting spilt.

A poem in 'Swinburning style' answering whether bicycles are fashioned of fear and fate, insisting that riders bear bold unashened hearts, sense joy and a spurring scout-run, and steer forth like yachting rovers for a pleasure raid.

A sonnet ('Summa cum laude') likening the bright upright wheel to a sunflower and to a revolving planet of light, a featherweight of air on which sober men ride above the mud at a pace no horseman can outride.

A sonnet after foreign samples bidding the learner not to linger in the riding rink but to seek the expansion of the country ride, where, once skilful and free of beginner's strife, health is a certainty and riding is life.

A sonnet after foreign samples reproaching the selectmen who afflict the road with rocks and ruts, complaining that the rough jolts of bumping shake the wheel's brittle steel where cyclists should skim with ease.

A sonnet after foreign samples in which a senior, after five years of fleet bicycling, says he must forbear the high wheel's heights but will let the tricycle convey him to distant towns, still raving of the bicycle in song.

A rondeau ('Mens vivida in corpore sano') in which a bicyclist, seeking to ease his love-lorn heart on his 'sportive lyre,' finds renovation brought by a wheely angel that warms his soul and body.

A poem (with the tag 'Sicut nobis sit cyclus omnibus') recalling notable Boston days when novel riding rolled before the churches and a wondering multitude, with angels on the towers gladly viewing the upright cyclists.

A short comic apostrophe to Boston as foremost city of first riders, dealers, and boasting bards, while the horse agitation departs and the bicycle reigns lord of the art with the tricycle as its queen.

A poem in which the poet, his heart full of go, first begs the song-bards in vain to celebrate bicycles, then quests through all of poetry to capture their metres, until the bards admit their fault and must mount to catch up with him.

A short dedication 'in the Greek manner' in which Bisakel, with the Uranian and Hygeian Muses, gives the poet a chaplet and breathes a bicyclic spirit on his soul to set wheels to comic song, with an 'A Word' coda claiming to be first to wed the wheel to fleet poesy.