Why I Bike in High Heels Year Round

Daddy said never let anyone tell you that being smart isn’t cool. Daddy said you can be smart and beautiful. Well, I play pretty tough, too. He left that part out. I’m toughest on a bike, this rust I ride through the city, dressed in all manner of finery, staring down the summer evening heat or dueling the wintery slush where curb meets street. I spit at the pedals of men who think they’re better than me. In my mind I always win the invisible race we knowingly join in after I slide these heels on with a wink. One inch, two inch, maybe three if I desire something secure, to climb higher than those other men, who look down on women like me dressing up their lanes. My lipsticked mouth laughs in their sweat stained faces as I pass them on the hill. Hey! Dare to watch me claim this middle of the road, cranking my sparkly footwear up to twenty miles per hour. Daddy, don’t worry, I wear a helmet. My head’s got plenty more pavement to cover before I yank the chain from my shoulder blades and lock my bike up tight for the night. Pretty nights melting away in silk skirts, cycles away from home. I’m mad, daddy, you forgot to tell me that it didn’t matter how many degrees nor curls in my hair I had. They’d walk all over me on payrolls and feed me sexist jokes. This is their payback. This is yours. I beat up the sun when it rises. I grind its dust to leave these guys in. I’m smart, I’m strong, I’m beautiful, I’m better than them because everything they can do I can do in pantyhose and laced up leather boots. Boy, let me show you that life is a fashion show, and this bike is my whole life. Ride or die handsome. While they overthink clipping in and fitting into spandex, I’m content in this wide space I take, high on the effortless speed of kick-ass wheels powered by some dainty heels. I look my best knowing exactly where I’m headed, nodding at little girls in crosswalks, one day, you could roll just like me.

Mary Geschwindt writes from New York, NY. A Pushcart Prize nominee and co-editor of the 2025 Gather Anthology, her poems have been published in the Upon Learning That Anthology, Gather, the Harvard Urban Review, and Rookie Mag. She is a transportation planner by day, poet by night, always looking for poetry in the movement of the city.