County Line

There is a cross on County Line.
Whose? I do not know.
It’s planted in the rocky ground.
Beside it lies the road.

It’s crooked askew and faded.
Its wood exposed off-white.
Next to it lies a marker,
An X by midnight’s light.

I wonder where he was going,
And if he knew somehow,
That I’d be driving by him
To my destination bound?

I detoured this morning.
Spied it in the dawning sun.
A woman bent upon it.
A pink sash around it hung.

Her sorrow full and apparent,
From near then far away,
And there at her feet, a second cross,
Impaled erect and stained.

In the mirror’s light she drifted.
I don’t know where to now.
Should I return this way tonight,
Or continue down the line?

© J. Manuel