"The Fool" by Robert Beveridge

Your thumb’s gotten you into trouble

before, but never too much for you

to quit the life. You haven’t pressed

an accelerator in longer than you

can remember, but a week ago

you were in the middle of the Badlands

and now here you are in the Appalachians,

full of pizza bread and armed

with directions. “Just take Jericho

all the way down past the churches,”

the trucker (whose name may or may not

have been Joshua) said, “and once you’re on 2

you’ll cross Crooked Creek twice

and you’re home free—you can follow the Ohio

as long as you want. More churches

and more cemeteries per capita than anyplace

else in these mountains.”* You had your heart

set on the Silverton Dairy Queen for dinner,

right down where 2 hits 77, and once

you’re on the Interstate, 

the trucks get bigger and the world smaller.

Rucksack strapped, shoes double-tied,

you set off down 22^nd, looked for the edge

of town where it turned into Jericho.

The slap of rubber on blacktop, the heat

of the day, the humidity, the hypnosis.

You even forget to extend your thumb for a while.

When you check back in with the pavement,

the horizon, the rolling fields, the state route signs

all gone, replaced with trees and potholes,

a gaggle of marked cars up towards the bend.

This ain’t Jericho, not by a longshot,

but you figure you might as well see

what there is to see. The woods

get thicker, deeper, a place carved out

for a house now and again. You notice

that the farther you go, the more trees

are dead, even the ones right on Crooked Creek

as it bends its way next to what is

no longer a road at times, but a path.

You taste kerosene in the air,

faint, but unavoidable, a kiss

of sweet, high ozone cuddled

by the sharpest of tangs. It could almost

be a cologne sample in a fashion magazine.

Then you break through the most recent stand of trees

and there it is, the shack with the red roof

that somehow you knew you would stumble upon.

You’ve seen this movie before,

and you know that this is the time

you want to beat feet back the way you came, 

get your thumb out to a superhuman distance

from your body, and find the nearest semi,

pickup, subcompact that can get you

to Silverton and a near-endless supply

of Dilly Bars. As you about face

you wonder if that kerosene

doesn’t hide a darker, more metallic odor.

It whispers to you on the breeze.

No road hypnosis this time.

The faster the better.

You spend ten minutes with your ears cocked,

waiting for some kind, any kind of engine

in pursuit, but you walk until you find your way

back to Jericho, extend your thumb, and hope for the best.

*As a side note: Joshua (or whoever he is) is incorrect. Tennessee has the highest number of cemeteries per capita in not only the Appalachians, but all of America. viz. https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/9sci5k/the_geography_of_the_dead_mapping_93000_of/

Robert Beveridge (he/him) makes noise (xterminal.bandcamp.com) and writes poetry on unceded Mingo land (Akron, OH). He published his first poem in a non-vanity/non-school publication in November 1988, and it's been all downhill since. Recent/upcoming appearances in We Are the Weirdos, The Poetry Lighthouse, and Rough Diamond, among others.