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Shrines

Sam Norman

Death sanctifies. It’s solemn enough to make its own shrine, where it happens.

—Charlotte Armstrong

The first has small photos
wrapped in plastic,
a big white cross,
and angels on sticks
thrust into the ground.

The second, on Rte 6,
along with the cross and pictures,
there’s a tiny bike with pink tassels.
I don’t even want to think about
who prays at this shrine, or how often.

Are they like me;
driving three miles out their way
to avoid our shrine?

Or do they drive by as often as they can?

Sometimes, when it gets bad,
I park on the inside of the curve,
near our modest shrine,
the one with a star nailed into the pole,
Ben written on reflective tape down its length.

I bend in supplication,
touch my forehead gently to the wood,
praying for what could have been.

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