he swore it was Sasquatch
who mauled him at his camp
when the last logs were but
hissing embers in his pit
others spotted them
in the Ouachitas--a pastor, constable
and my own son, likely high on hash,
said he heard Bigfoot's heavy rumbling
in a light rain
I was the doc on call,
when the man's pick up rolled to a dead stop
at the ER door--addled, he swore the beast
brought him to us, without ever having
been in his truck's cab
I hadn't seen such lacerations
except when self induced, but the man
did not waver from his story:
at quarter past four
on the clock, he was flung, down bag
and body both, into the deep snow
the creature made entreaties without words,
but his wild, sour moans, the man proclaimed, may
have been nothing but the beast begging to be left
alone to remain a mystery
one never solved,
kept alive around other’s fires,
by those who did not let them wane,
who fed the blaze and kept it roaring,
to keep the beast at bay
yet invisible, but alive another day
just beyond the fires' searching light
silent, eternal in the mythic night
Sasquatch, Sasquatch
*Sasquatch/Bigfoot sightings have occurred across North America, mostly in the northwest. However, the Ouachitas of Oklahoma and Arkansas have had their share. Talimena is the name of the highway that stretches 50 miles across the top of this remote range.
