Scott Laudati

Published: November 16th, 2015

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Scott Laudati lives in NYC with his boxer, Satine. He is the author of Hawaiian Shirts In The Electric Chair (Kuboa Press). Visit him-  or on instagram @scottlaudati

Mick and Keith pt. 1

I hated gallery openings.
there 
were usually a few 
girls, sure,
but they were 
“artists
waiting
for inspiration”
so, 
while
waiting for whatever 
divine intervention 
comes
to paint people’s canvases
for them,
the girls brought 
the cocaine
and they lay
on their
backs
pretty easy. 

She came to me
once, my first
gallery opening
and said, “I know
you’re going
to break
my heart”.
She 
hadn’t
cut her bangs
yet (though she would)
and she hadn’t
shed her winter fat
(though she would)
but I kissed her anyway
because 
I’m easy
and I understand
why women leave
bars with men
who look
like
they were 
born old
and never been boys
in love.
It’s the same reason
I kissed her,
she gave me 
something.
I just needed
to feel that I mattered
that night 
and I knew
I mattered 
to her.

There was a joke
she didn’t have to tell
to make me laugh.
with her
it felt like high school
they were all
against us
and we 
were winning.
She’d make me write.
Her desk was
filled with ashtrays
and coke lines
and photography
books.
I’d write 
a paragraph
and she would shriek
and the dog would jump
on it’s back legs
and they would dance
around me.

It was never morning.
she could spin
the moon so
the night 
lasted forever.
an entire winter
of cocaine
and a spanish beauty
and a dog.
I never had
any money
but she didn’t care.
she kept cooking
kept supplying
and I kept promising
that
someday when
I made it
all the dedications
would be hers.

The artists all
loved her.
No one had any
money
and we all
needed
booze
and drugs
and love
and she gave it,
never 
asked for any in return.
The spoils
were mainly for
me
and I’d promise her
things
but never stopped taking.
And one night
she cried and
begged me
to 
never leave her alone.
And of course,
I said
ok.

But we never
robbed
the bank
together.
And we didn’t
steal the car
and drive
to California.
She needed
a life
that was hers.
It was the first time
I saw 
fear in her 
eyes.
Our scene couldn’t operate
without her
but the world
could 
live
without 
our scene.

I’d tell
her someday
the readers would
know what
she did.
At our worst
she held us
like the mother
most were
missing.
And then
one
day 
I left
and I 
didn’t think
much of 
what her life
would be
without me
because
I never thought
much
of myself.

Now it’s
all I 
think
about. 
what
a promise
means. She
made the world
a better place,
maybe two
people
in history
could
say that.
And 
there’s the
last night,
when I 
said, “fuck you”
and left.

There’s still
a lot of night
still dogs
still blow
but 
air and water signs 
they’ve 
never been 
so 
separate. 
It doesn’t
feel like
high school
now,
they’re still
against us
but
that’s 
no
victory
anymore.

I watched
her 
dance the
fado
and drink
the sad wine.
But people 
can’t just 
let go
and 
that was something 
we were 
worse at.
We fixed our 
hearts 
but they 
broke 
just as 
easy,
left in poems 
and pictures 
for our 
children 
to think 
we lived happy 
lives.

I
still drink
the sad
wine
and if I try
I don’t
think of
her sometimes.

You Just Can't Win

When you
move
to manhattan
you meet
a lot 
of people (mainly women)
who come
from “means”.
they hang out
in the marble
lobbies
of 
boutique hotels
and drink
fancy 
cocktails
and talk a lot
of shit.

I met
a girl
on the job
who worked 
at a “non-profit” 
where 
basically 
you asked your parents 
not to give 
you 
any Christmas gifts.
Instead,
you
asked them to donate 
the gift money to the 
“non-profit” 
for just the 
one day, of that 
one year. 

Our first date (our only date)
went fine.
She played
the ukulele
I played the guitar
we sang 
taylor swift
songs
and looked
at the domino sugar factory
and when I said
“lets go to the water front”
she said,
“my apartment
has a better view”

Later,
I sat 
with
a cigarette
on her brooklyn 
roof top 
patio 
overlooking 
all of 
downtown Manhattan 
and
I
thought about 
how nice life was
to those
who could
forfeit their Christmas money
and still
pay rent 
on an apartment 
with a 
roof top patio 
that 
overlooked 
all 
of 
downtown Manhattan.

Eventually I had to leave 
and I ate 
for 
the first time that 
day 
the one 
piece 
of 
dollar pizza 
I could scum 
up enough 
change 
to buy 
and 
all around me 
were 
one 
legged bums 
and 
Mexican families 
with 30 kids 
and the short black man 
with no teeth 
who sang 
the lollipop gang 
song 
for 
some loot.

And 
I knew I’d never be her hero 
and it 
wasn’t even winter, 
every puddle 
I stomped 
through 
broke apart, 
but eventually 
when 
the ripples 
came back together
it 
was 
still me 
I 
was 
staring at. 

She 
may have been 
the savior 
of 
the starved, 
but the next morning
I
had 
a text message
that said,
“you’re really
nice, but
i can’t
date
a 
bellman.
it just 
wouldn’t
look
right”.

It was
another
night
I abandoned
my dog 
for 
a woman
that I’d never
get back

Something Like Love

I 
miss you
blue eyes
lying in your
bed
while you walked
across campus
looking at
jersey mountains
rolling away from your path
like the sleeping stomachs
of giant buddhas
and me staying 
warm
making the bed
so we could unmake it
using your roommates
teapot to bring
your small bones back to
life
and your soft skin
under my heat
it could be love you said.

You hate
me now
blue eyes
you used the
bruises of your old
lovers to build back
something more
and I let my old
loves leave me
with less
I could see 
no dark spots
in you
but my pain
needed company
and when once
you thought
love could conquer
by our epitaph
your eyes
held the ruin of
an idea
abandoned
it could’ve been love you said.

Who are we
now blue eyes?
I’ve erased
the words and the doubt
I only remember
how your cat ran away
every time I opened the door
and even though
your dad was
a cop I tried
to like him anyway
we had no vices
then
we could go
to the zoo sober
and smile at turtles
and pet giraffas
that night we drove all night
I reminded you of
those turtles
who seemed to smile back
and we rolled
and kissed
and ignored our sins
and once again
we talked about
forever
I always try and
go back to 
that night I let you 
get on the plane
and you left me
and new jersey behind
it can still be love
I said.

I always try and go back to that night
in my mind
in my songs
because 
it was something like love
we were something like love

Men

I never
questioned that
my father was a
real man, he
could do
those
things. Things
weaker fathers couldn’t.
(give a funeral
speech without
tearing. build a shed
and fill it
with tools
he knew how
to use). 
Things 
they say
make a man.

My father
had no doubt 
that
I was not a man,
had none of the
qualities
and didn’t show 
much hope
of figuring it out.

He liked to 
say, “you think
you just flush
a toilet
and it goes
away?
what’s going to
happen when it doesn’t
go away
and it comes back
and you and all your
idiot
friends are drowning
in poop?
you’re all
gonna
die because
you don’t even know
how to use
a toilet
plunger.
you’ll see”

His brother
was the same.
he wrestled
in high school
and he 
always said it
taught him
things but as
far as I could
tell he did
everything wrong

They both had
a favorite
place
to give
advice. 
On the couch.
During
football commercials.

I found 
it hard to concentrate
on words
men spoke 
while watching other 
men
throw balls 
at each other
and try
their hardest 
to lay on
the most 
submissive one.

Sports. 
This was
supposed
to be the triumph
of all men, 
and every sunday 
my dad 
would yell
and cry, 
never giving any thought
to after 
the game, when 
all
forty of them took one big
shower together.

A Prophet

They
were parents from
the suburbs
and they were scared of 
New York.
She was fat
in her neck 
and her knees
and he had his socks pulled 
up to his 
fanny pack
and I thought
“if this was New York
in any other era
they’d be picked clean”.
Hell,
I might’ve even done it
they just looked so 
weak.
She was yelling at
her husband over 
a map
they were lost.
they were afraid.

I saw him come
out of the subway
no shirt
maybe two teeth
and as he passed me
he smelled like
a gallon of fermented
malt piss.

“What should we do?”, the fat lady asked
the bum
came up 
behind them and leaned in
“burn your bodies”, he said.

It was the first
time I thought
maybe there was someone on the other
end of that telephone all 
the bums seem to be on.

And they gave pretty
good advice.