Waiting ~~ anna hood ~~

Four o'clock: nearly dark
night in the afternoon.
Winter darkness.
The dogs whine for one last run.
I get my jacket.
In the field beside the house
mouse trails scribble back and forth
across pale blonde grass.
Hundreds of crows returning home
to Victoria Park blacken the sky.
They are either hated or loved
no neutral.
I like 'em.

The dogs three little terriers
two sleek, one fat and hairy
put up a raft of black ducks.
We pause for a second on the dock
these dogs and I
watch the ducks, watch
the sea slide her slick skin
over the rocks, sighing as she retreats.
I sit in the splintery
paint-peeling Adirondack chair
under the old floor lamp I've hauled
down from the house.
The corona of pink silk shade trembles
her fringes.

It's a fire hazard, I know.
Extension cords linked
together like words
in a poem, snake their way
across the yard, over the dandelions
and crab grass and creeping charlie
that we call a lawn
their joints bristling with electicity.
Sometimes there are sparks.

The dogs race up and down
the silvery boards. I sit
in the pale pink light
and wait for winter.

It always comes.