2 poems by Scott Laudati

Farmhouse On The Gasconade

It’s a warm January in these Ozark foothills.

There is no land like this back east,

there are no people like this either.

If you feel hunted do not come here,

this is where the hunters write their poetry.

This deck I’m standing on overlooks

a brown and fast moving river.

Two brown and fast moving dogs

emerge from it, a bone with fur

and dripping veiny blood is held between

both of their jaws, and they roll and tug

and wag their tails like they’ve just

caught the last deer in Missouri.

It wasn’t a crime 200 years ago to rid these hills

of the Osage, but there’s blood out here that digs

deeper than the roots of these skinny Oaks.

It’s stronger than the currents of these brown rivers.

It comes at night when you drive back to town.

The road you left on doesn’t drop you off

where you found it. Doors swing open

untouched by the wind. Everyone knows the

same secret though they’d never share it.

The hunters will expire in one or two more floods

and all the old men will be gone,

forgotten and unpraised.

But the Sasquatch at the bottom of the hill

has raised his family here for generations.

He has outlasted the Osage, and he will outlast us.

Scorched treaties. Indignant hands. Last words.

He awaits the liturgy of the kingfisher,

a cannon shot to signal the

nothingness of a nothing world

finally being re-inherited by its rightful servants.

In Front Of The Closed Formosa Cafe

they’ll tell you “it’s your life”

and either all of it is

or none of it is,

that’s up to you.

they won’t tell you this is all

one big nothing, though,

and eventually you’ll stop

starting something new

because you’re ashamed of them

finding out you quit again.

it’s the one’s who say they love you

that’ll scare you the most,

they know something about you,

they’ll use it to hurt you.

and when then cards fall

the faults don’t split straight,

as anyone under the mushroom cloud

will admit.

so make your choice soon.

or don’t.

fallen trees and most suicides

have marched quietly

into the silent night.

Scott Laudati has been to Earth, TX three times. His new book of poetry, Rainbow Road, will be released by Bone Machine, Inc. June 25th. Visit him anywhere @ScottLaudati.