For Jenny Schulz
White pines, bark the burnt clay of the chapel
bricked together sabbaths after second service,
served as lodestar to the kin who’d knelt
before the stones of their departed,
crowns above the corn leading the way
sight of a steeple quickens the pace
of a peddler heading to town. Then, roots
began to buck residents heavenward
as if the Harrowing had begun, and so the trees
came down, trunks hewn into lectern and pew,
posts for the signs on the long straight stretch
of C56 needed now to tell those
who want to offer prayers where to go.
