Getting Off

I have taken to cycling again after a lapse of a generation,
How long I hardly care to tell,
And on the whole, taking everything into consideration,
I am getting on fairly well;
Getting on, in fact, I don't find at all harassing,
I can stick on too, easily enough,
But the thing that I do find rather embarrassing
Is that I can't get off.

All kinds of things happen when I take my feet off the pedals;
Sometimes I stand on one leg like a goose;
Sometimes I plunge head-first into a bed of nettles,
Which is not just what one would choose;
Now and then I fetch up all standing
Against a bank or a wall,
And occasionally I execute an out-and-out pancake landing
Which is not nice at all.

I seem to remember hopping off easily and lightly,
I can't imagine how,
With a kind of curtseying motion, most graceful and sprightly,
But I can't do it now.
Still, I keep on trying with grim desperation,
Though the going's rather rough,
And thinking all the time how I shall enjoy the sensation
When I remember how to get off.