Of all the things to be taken,

Your head was the first to go.

I wonder how it happened, 

Maybe it was a dreadful storm

Passing through, ripping up

Oak trees, tearing off rooftops

And decapitating an era. 

Or was it decades of gravity,

A chain encrusted with years of 

esteem and fortune,

The weight too much for your 

Aging neck to bear?

Defaced, yet you stood tall

Though everything you knew crumbled,

Leaving shattered glass and 

neglected memories at your feet. 

Buildings rose around you as 

You grieved, the skeleton of what was

Like a festering sore

To the left of your spine,

Just out of reach.

Everyone used to visit you,

Children and adults alike

Climbing on your back, clinging 

To your neck for safety,

It was you that brought them here,

And you who helped them carry on.

Yet it was you who never moved,

A constant in an ever changing world.

Others may not glance back at you anymore,

To them you’re just another fading

Color in their rear view mirror,

Just a hunk of fiberglass on a cracked square

Of cement. 

Maybe that’s all you should be, 

Maybe that’s all you were meant to be,

Yet I can’t drive down Frazee Street

Without looking for you, 

Without seeing the gaping hole 

Among the overgrown shrubs

And remembering.