Advent

“What are you waiting for?” is a reasonable enough question
To ask someone simply standing in the middle of a street
Or at the corner while the light begins to change,
The little hand flashing an anxious yellow warning
To the fellow there in front of you, the girl on the curb
With the large bag, the umbrella on a bright day
And the “sensible” shoes; rocks in the river
Creating whorls and eddies in the traffic stream,
Rapids, the current dancing over the little fall of granite
Into the white bordered channel from one bank to the other
Dividing on the other side around the woman with
The hands full of toddler and stroller just before
The last change of all that brings everything to a stop.