waiting (a poem)

A leaf
Skids by on the cold pavement
She watches it go
Skirting the mountain of limestone and brick
Helpless against the incessant wind
- not cruel, perhaps, but relentless, blind.

She sits alone
Knees to shoulders
Shoes abandoned, feet drawn beneath her skirt
(She’ll ruin it for sure, sitting there against the wall)
Clutching her transcripts, corners fluttering
She’s trying her best not to
crumple them,
Lose them.

Not this time.
The soft strains of an old refrain drift through her soul -

this, the One
that will stay -
this one the wind cannot blow away.