Imagine a vast hillside which you see 

While passing in a car along an interstate. 

Place it to the west, in central Illinois, 

To keep your vision near to mine, 

North of Sangamon, where hills are rare. 

The time is early spring, the hillside wet and brown, 

Stubbly from last fall's crop, ready for drill and seed. 

The perfect rows are perpendicular to the road, 

So that as you pass each one flashes, 

Pointing upward, to the crest of the hill. 

A farmer's field, and he has not left a single tree,

All there is to see, nearly, are rows of dirt and sky. 

But at the rise, some way off, a square of green. 

It is passing quickly, but you see that it is a grove, 

In fact, a cemetery, evergreens and deciduous trees 

Left for shade, and ragged rows of chiseled stones, 

And that the farmer has plowed as near as he dared, 

Up to and along each side, and then again beyond, 

Utilizing every tillable inch, leaving the dead what, 

By custom, has been allowed to them, and nothing more.