The gray day slid away quickly. Before I knew it I caught a glimpse of the red sun slipping behind another cloud band. In the fading light I shuffled with Warren and the dog around the pond in the fading light. Shifting shadows, hundreds of diving ducks, and a biting wind trailed alongside.
The Day Is Gray and the Lake
The Day Is Gray and the Lakeshifts, mercurial,
like modeling clay,
the million thumbs
of wind at work upon it,
the artist unable to come
to a single conclusion.
Just what shape should
this cold lake take
this morning?
And the trees surrounding?
The maker can't
make up his mind, always
fussing. He shuffles
the shoreline shadows
like a paint-chip deck.
The reeds.
The nervous birds.
The toads, forever lost
on mud's malleable maps.
Everything's a mess
and genius all at once,
a school for unruliness.
Even the stones second
guess themselves, eroding.
And there: a wash of sunshine,
and some people, boating.
--Todd Boss in Yellowrocket
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