Monuments

Monuments

I see them everywhere: small tributes
to those whose last breaths
were taken along these roads.

Crosses and bundles of silk flowers,
stuffed bears, small photos, and glittering
streamers grow alongside the weeds.

So many memorials: the shoulder seems
too small to hold it all.
Some lean under the weight of their grief.

The silver chain hangs around my neck:
his hands were the last to touch it.
It's just long enough to drop between

my breasts. At first it was cold and foreign,
but I let it warm, let the sliver of it
rise and fall, mark this empty space.