Waiting Game

December,
out at the lake,
and everything's the same
dispirited shade of

picnic-table brown 

except for the water,
whose Crayola hue is 
the slightly more colorful
dirty sock soup

But the pines
will maintain,
as stiff as saints

and the sky
still startles
to the provocation
of crows

and it's fine,
in its way

this waiting game

I'll take the crumbs
that fall my way

like a want
of horse flies
to chew up my legs

the promissory sun  
after a week of rain

and a few crusty leaves
that just refuse, 
by golly,
to budge 

Which is the kind of old lady
I hope to become

though that, too,
can wait