Rural Carolina

At the corner of 133 and Old Fayetteville
Road, there’s a Baptist Missionary Church
newly arisen from a dilapidated Speedy Gas.
I‘d watched the resurrection proceed
from hollowed-out, graffitied shell
to white-washed, cross-crowned clapboard -
another conclave for Jesus. Like the mall space 
reclamation and the feed store transformation 
a few miles away in another and another and another 
rural Carolina, bible-belt county.
About two dozen pick-ups, sedans and wagons
congregate there every Sunday, 9:00-1:00,
transport for the converts who come to pray 
for the favor of exemption 
from the damnation their Bible implies 
for heathen nonbelievers.

Different name; same game.
Fill ‘em up with high test and send them 
on their way, a little lighter in the wallet
but bound, no doubt, for Glory Road.