On the North-East corner of Simcoe and Dundas was a cross made of mesh wire wrapped in a double tube to form a crudely shaped cross on a balsa wood base. The cross was placed on the wall next to a popular heating grate. Numerous memorial notes were taped on the cross and wall. Some of the notes and condolence cards appeared to be well written and on good quality paper taped on by office workers of nearby buildings, and shoddy scraps scrawled by other soaks.
        Inside the cards were a range from articulate condolences to sentimental scrawlings; words to the effect of �we will miss you...we will never forget...your spirit will be here forever...thank-you so much.� These words strike one as something that the deceased should have been told while still alive. The deceased is more noticed now then some who spend a lifetime in the office spaces. The notes are a testiment that even in a secular construct the extremes of death and poverty are still noted, in acknowledgment and homage to the fact that that such states exist and are within us all.
        There is a destitute who usually occupied the corner and shared his bottles of �intestine disolver� with the deceased and has temporarily absented himself out of respect. Days later when he returned, he shared some words about the worked over native�s death.
        �Yeah, he died of hypothermia-froze to death. Someone took the shirt right off his back while he was sleeping. He was so far gone he didn�t know. He froze without his shirt. They kept his memorial for four days, and the grounds keeper then threw it out! They just threw it out. I asked them, �how would you like your mural taken from your grave before it�s time even? Anybody else gets ten days. How wouldja like that?��
        A major Toronto newspaper ran a front page feature article on the worked over native the day after his death. With the article was a black and white photo of a younger, less swollen and battered man that gazed intently through tall weeds at the camera lens from beneath a highway overpass. The photograph was part of a series done on Toronto�s destitute, that seems to have aestheticized their plight.
Closing Note On The Worked Over Native
"Sketches: Dundas and University" by i. khider
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