Sometimes at night
when the streets are quiet
I can hear the crosswalk
talk from the stoplight
by my house

Wait
Wait
Wait

And sometimes when
I can hear the crosswalk
counting down
I close my eyes and

I’m on the street corner and
headlights are speeding
past me and my head
is pounding along with
the bass lines
and my breathing
is getting labored
and it would be so easy
but the stoplight is
yelling wait

as if it knows what’s
to come

as if it understands any more
than the thirty seconds
between green and red