the sieve and the sand

“Ya’ll hear ‘bout the feller who
sold his sole to the devil?
‘Said he felt bad for ‘em in all,
walking all that time
without no shoes.
‘Said he reckoned his feet musta
been sore as hell.”

the land where nothing sucks

down in the valley of
the land where nothing sucks
there is naught but a
forest of carnivorous weeds

it is the norm of the valley
for there to be no sun
and it is their way of life
to love darkness and eating

so not being one to judge
i avoid the valley
as often as humanly possible
and stay downwind

–

the butterfly in the valley

and once
a butterfly
i saw did
haplessly
flutter
into the
valley

and the weeds did salivate
as it was their norm
and who am i to judge?
looking away as
they devoured her
wholly

i wrote this in the margin
of the notes i was taking for class
i meant it be poetic
but instead it came out crass

the prof was speaking of revelation
and i was writing of poo
the writing was slightly distracting
and i failed to think his words through

so i kept on writing of feces
while the prof droned on over details
my mind downstairs in the restroom
where i planned to unloaded my entrails

There is an unyielding natural force
that keeps one’s feet on the ground
and one’s pencil rolling on one’s desk
in lieu of floating out one’s window
And it is a boon and a quality
and a reasonable necessity in these days

But yours is an unnecessary gravity,
a stress and a stretch and an
erroneous sort of thing, and it seems
but a weight to drag one down
rather than a hook to keep one grounded

And though I feel your less-than-sublte pressures,
There is one grace that saves me from their hold:
Newton’s may be a law,
but yours is just a caveat

Draping downwards
Roadside telephone wires bow like the naked bones of Circus tents.
Clutching, unmoving, lined atop each cable,
The black robed tribunal of crows
Sentences judgment on every car that passes.

and I like it,
as the sensation spreads
from the head,
through the neck,
relaxing the shoulders,
and the breathing releases
and the heart rebounds
so that i’m not tight at all,
and I like it.

a crow alights
upon the church’s skyward cross–
leaves scrape cobblestone.

pillow soft.
but donut ring around beer
perhaps challenges
pillow soft
for place of love
in my heart

The leaves are turning
and so comes the obligatory photos
and poems (and this one included):
Dry crumpled detritus snaps from branches
and blows away, coloring sidewalks
and church-yards and golf courses. It is
an ironically colorful sort of death
that permeates these late days.
I’m sure, too, it’s the end of an era
in someone’s overall inconsequential
microcosm, but that’s to be expected:
The winds blow change in every year,
don’t they?

And if your soul is hurting
I’ll lend you mine and you
can use it however you need
and I’ll fix it if you break it
and I’ll wash it if you scuff it up
and it’ll be yours forever
or at least until that haystack hair
grows out

mountains
impress me
the united states’ highway
system
impresses me

how millions of men over
a hundred years built
concrete and steel structured
planes across the expanse
of the entire united states
moving
daily
an unfathomable amount of things

that impresses me

your
bottom drawer wit
and parlour tricks
do not.

Staring at a cement parking bumper
My fears squirm out of it and punch me in the nose.
I want to shed every eye and hide from view
Until they aren’t looking to me anymore.
I am a child trembling like a pencil between Parkinson’s fingers

fuck you, he said
then dissolved into
the rainy evening.

she shut the door like thunder
then fell against it,
melting into the floor.

eyes clouded with tears,
head in hands flashing hate,
she prayed to God:

Jesus, why is this so fucking hard?
let me be stone. let me be the ground.
solid. unfeeling. undisturbed. Jesus,
why is this so fucking hard? just
get me the hell out
of this body.

with stacks and rows of words
bound with glue in glorious
long-form i sit and study being
mocked by the fact i’m still told
what to consume when deliciousness
surrounds me like a child in a candy
shop i’m handed a carrot and told
to eat while gazing with longing
at peach rings and runts
my computer open before me
and books written by fools with their
heads in the clouds but academic
degrees they fancy while in the
company of hemmingway and salinger
i drool, for, like that child, i know not
how to ignore exactly what i know i’m
missing

having had enough warmth
i welcome winter’s arresting breath
let me leave the windows open
go to sleep shivering
wake up beneath covers soft as God’s lips
having held the one i love throughout the night.

every day in this magnificent place
and i put on my shoes and took them off
and ran much too far in the rain
but how can i turn around when the
cold spatters against my face
and i know you’re doing it for me
(as vain as that sounds)
but i must keep running and enjoying your
joy and wondering of those who miss it
and pushing farther and farther knowing
every step forward means one step back
and ignoring it for 50 minutes or so

To plant a kiss on the hood of an idling car
and pray it makes the next rest stop
because that’s all the more you have to drive
so Triple ‘A’ will cover the tow
while your child is in the back seat
crying because the heater’s broken
and the Air Conditioner is on in dead of winter
just to keep the windows half-transparent
is a blessing in disguise:

Your ride has 3 “A’s on the side,
not one, that ends in ‘Mbulance’.

i’ven’t a moment to reflect on the trees passing
by my window for merely keeping this thing on
the road is requiring all my focus. they’ve told
me the world at 300mph is fundamentally different
and i’m finding it’s even more complicated when
every moment the wheels, engine, or at least
air conditioning may give out due to lack of funds
for proper maintenance, and i know what passes
each moment is a travesty to have missed but the
finish line is in view, and if this thing can
hold it together just a little longer there’ll be
more than enough time to stop and smell the roses
for this thing will be put to rest. maintenance
no longer necessary as i’ll be mounting a two wheeled
man-powered beauty and cruising for the foreseeable
future

Across the hills and things
we discovered a derelict power station
with no lines connected to anything
and a concrete driveway that’d been
halfway milled back to dust and I thought
that a power station with no lines
was a sorry sort of power station indeed
and the way time moves there’s no saving it
and the way things go we can’t hook it back up
so there it’s going to sit and rot and things
and I’ll go back and try to be nothing like it
but goodness knows I probably will be.

It’s a wreck.
A downright disaster.
The floorboards creak – speak out of turn, forget to apologize.
New insulation is a necessity; heat escapes the second floor too often.
The sewer’s unpredictable, doesn’t work right as soon as you need it to.
The electricity shuts off just when you’re in the middle of an important project—
Stutters, stops, acquiesces—needs a moment.
No doubt there are more cobwebs in the attic than you could shake a stick at—
Termites seem to have infiltrated the woodwork and they’re tenacious to get out.
It’s possible there’s water damage in the basement, the structure might be unsound.
I’ve been looking into insurance, but I’d settle for assurance if you’re interested.
Yeah, that’s me. I’m a fixer-upper and I need some Tender Loving Care.
I’m looking for someone who knows a thing or two about restoration—
A carpenter, perhaps?—but his son would do.

It’s a good felt hat
come all the way from Germany
and yea, you look pretty good in it
but I can’t say that out loud,
if only because that’s what you want
and sister, I can’t have none of it.

Your smile’s nice, too,
and body language is careless
and were I but another man
or a lesser man, you’d have me
and hook and line too
(sinkers are for bottom-feeders)

But my leg muscles are strong
when riding a bar stool
and my body does not always speak
when spoken to
and you can keep smiling
but when you finally give my hat back,
you won’t get anything in return.

Sorry.

sometimes just to feel the life inside of me
i like to bust open the doors of the retirement home and
with my pants off i make a break for it in my chair
wheeling down the street in the snow i
slip and slide like a youth on drugs
except I’m old and on heart medication

but the wind is in my hair.

i gathered up rocks on a beach
i put them in order and began
the inquiry

which of you will kill me?

these rocks being people, though
after the inquisition i
ran up a hill

lost my foothold and fell

passing through the void
i knew i knew i knew i’d
been right

but i could never know which

and this is how it always goes

Let me be like Thomas
that I would say,
I have felt his wounds.

Put your finger here,
see my hands.

He has awakened me
from the dead.

Reach out our hand
and put it into my side.
Stop doubting and believe.

i pick up the phone and give it the old
english try

but there is something distinctly
un-english
about my bad english
my lack of manners
and general confusion about social
norms in the country i’m supposed to identify
with