Roadside Calvary

.

The dark curved skid
leads to a gashed tree,
its wept sap hardened,
around which are placed
shriveled bouquets, notes,
and a wood cross painted white
and pounded into the ground
with a tacked-on graduation photo:
young man smiling.
Parents made this shrine,
and of his room a museum.
Desk with dictionary and pencil holder.
Honor roll certificates,
sports posters on the wall.
The bed kept neat,
though the sheets still smell of him.
One may enter,
carefully dust the keepsakes,
lie on the bed
and play their mind's home movies:
His first birthday.
That Christmas they gave him a telescope.
The baseball game
when he slid home—
safe.

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