There are no tourists today
at this obscure site
only a temporary shrine
to a girl who was never a Movie Star

just some plastic flowers, a melted-down candle and
a destroyed t-shirt

Broken green glass and
trampled on roses
surround
the headstone of the girl
who never emerged from the starlet phase,
never had to conceal herself in sunglasses and scarves,

the girl who would have loved to be recognized
died in anonymity and
remains as such,
buried in a cemetery next to an expressway

Uncelebrated and unmourned
Her gravesite, shabby, mostly ignored,
sometimes used as a party spot by kids who never knew her
the next generation of disinterested youth
listening to music that will be forgotten before they reach twenty.

The body that decayed beneath them was
never immortalized by the silver screen,
despite being traded on, often
desperate to reach the summit of celebrity

The abandoned paraphernalia
above her
belies a calm
never experienced by the girl,
not even in death.

With thanks to etouffee

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