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This writing was accepted for publication in the 108 page perfect-bound ISSN# / ISBN# issue/book “i am not alone” Down in the Dirt, v182 (the April 2021 Issue) Order the paperback book:

Order this writing that appears in the one-of-a-kind anthology Excerpts from the Plague Years the Down in the Dirt Jan.-April 2021 issues collection book		get the 420 page Jan.-April 2021 Down in the Dirt 6" x 9" ISBN# perfect-bound paperback book:

Dark Road

Donna M. Davis

I’ve often wondered
where a dark road leads,
when crazed tree limbs cast shapes
against the racing moon,
and drivers speed to chase stars
around the next turn.
The road is always there,
linking one place to another
across thousands of miles.
Along the hairpin bends
of “13 Curves,” it brings
a bride in a bloody wedding gown
killed when her groom
veered into Onondaga Creek.
She appears at twilight
crying bitterly, a lantern in her hand.
An unwary driver stops to help,
then watches her form fade,
her lace sleeves empty of life.
He counts the curves back to one.
His hands, a fragile prayer for dawn,
clasp the steering wheel.

More than five states away,
on Goatman’s Bridge,
travelers glimpse the spectre
of a black goat farmer
lynched below the railing.
They pass the fields
where Klansman burned his house
and slaughtered his family.
Legend says his corpse disappeared
after the killers let it hang for days.
One murderer choked to death
while eating dinner.
Two later fell from the bridge
and died in orange mist.
Another perished from fever,
hallucinating the dead man’s spirit.
The bridge had loomed
in their nightmares,
the nexus of good and evil,
the present and the past,
distant stars shining on its girders,
the mystery of where
a dark road leads.

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