Revisiting Ellis Cemetery

I made myself invisible
Walking the stony path uphill,
Stopping to look at deer tracks
Hoping to find some shed antlers,
Other hikers on the path passed me by
As I arrived breathless
At the top of the cold and lonesome hill,
A hill that is nowhere in particular,
That overlooks nothing but trees
On other hills,
No breathtaking vista,
No magnificent sunsets,
Making me wonder why this choice
For eternal rest
Of the 50 or so inhabitants,
Some with modern grave markers,
Others with merely a piece of the local limestone
Planted in the ground,
Stood on edge
To delineate the depression behind it,
Or sometimes in front of it,
As I tried to avoid stepping on anyone’s ancestors
Two hikers with a GPS stopped and pointed it at me,
“Cemetery,” one said quoting the Northing and Easting
As I moved behind the twin oaks,
Keeping out of their sight line ,
Avoiding the bleeping locator,
“Ghostbusters,” I thought and someone behind me laughed,
Or was it the squirrel chattering in the shag bark hickory?
There is no Ellis except for this cemetery on the hill,
Most of the inhabitants died around the turn of the century,
They lie in waiting
With no room for any newcomers,
I walked back down the hill
Hovering over the rocks and fallen timber,
The only tracks behind me left by antlerless deer.