the sieve and the sand

a different life source;
something from inside this
time, and i picture the kid
who just found it staring
down at his chest and thinking
“that was different.” wondering
from whence it came, and if
it plans on staying around
because there are a few fields
he can think of sprinting through
a little faster than ever
before, if this after-burner
is going to stick around.

and that bmx track? he bets
he can fly around the graded
corners a little bit different
than he has before.

and he just stands there
imagining the possibilities
(if this is going to last)
for a few minutes as the revelation
of what just happened is a bit
much to take in right now.

but that grin, as he stares down
at his chest, that grin just keeps
growing on his face and it’s
like a light has been
turned on inside.

oh the horror of the mold
on the edge of the cheese
which wont be removed with
the swift slice of a knife
despite your prowess in
wielding objects of the
sharp assortment because
the mold is merely a metaphor
of something much harder to
extract from your worthless
life. the kind once valuable
but stored for much too long
in an environment much too
stale and humid, hence the
mold. you were asked about
this at 17, when you admitted
you knew not the meaning
of life, but you chose to
live on anyhow. like that
cheese — under-refrigerated.

oh the horror of the
worthlessness of meaningless
life rubbed in your face on
this long drive between home
and your old home where your
parents live but you were too
ball-less to move far enough
away to make a clean break
and find direction and do
something worthwhile.

yes
your life is meaningless.

and not because of your
dead-end job at the local
coffee shop. but because your
passion dried up in jr. high
when you turned down the only
thing you ever knew was
undeniably true.

i dwell on invincibility
when time is short
and worthwhile thought
will probably drive useful
conclusions but take
utterly too much time.

so i stand in front of busses
and fly off of cliffs,
out of airplanes and
underwater
in my mind
because it takes me nowhere
of any value

my favorite place to be

coffee at three
and new friends
(more than i can manage)
bring new conversation
and a schizophrenic (my first experience)
who brought…
new conversation.

and coffee at three
to keep me up till two.

contrasted with truth
the lies are just a bit
overwhelming
the burdens
too real.

a bout of gilbert’s syndrome
(a flare up if you will)
to remind me of my out-vincibility
and the likelihood of death
(1 in 1)

a reminder i could have used
just about any other tuesday.

but then again, such flares
are specific to such days.

and their single-layerness
their supposed callus-inducing
zippers (a common misconception)
and the way they bend and grow
and mold with me

from youth
till now
and furthermore
my friend
my pants will
ever be

and that love will be demonstrated in a once-each-month ritual cleansing process less religious than one might think, though certainly not lacking ritualistic practice. there will be a soak, a wash, a rinse, and tumble dry cycle — religiously, almost as if by machine.

turning it off like a faucet
is possible and almost just as easy.
however the sudden lack of
flooding in my mind is not
nearly so black-and-white
desirable
as an un-flooded kitchen.

sure things would be clearer,
cleaner, and less work to keep
mold-free.
but shutting out the chaos
just sounds so damn boring.

a morning to contemplate
to dwell
on truth for a change
and seek something
of worth
a morning to spend
not uselessly in bed
for a change.

i recall youth
and fields where i asked my father
to explain the minutiae of the
grain my family called ‘wheat’.
i’d run through with broken
shoes on skinny paths past
harmless snakes and burst past
sandstone while chomping straw
freshly picked and void of
grain as it’d already been chewed.

i recall smiling as the skies were so
bright my mother feared for sunburn;
that and my father’s smile of delight
on his boy and his utter obliviousness
to the complex world around him.

i was there when snow fell and filled
the dirty fields with redemptive white
long before i understood any symbolism
i appreciated the beauty, even the cold.

and the mountains i took for granted?
now i regret my lack of understanding.
regret my granted taking
my youth leaving
and my lack of picturesque memory keeping.

my most brilliant yet
wait till july to resolve
and change things half a year.

long term is overrated hence
my most brilliant yet

your model is broken
but we’ve got a fix for you
a tweak here and change
in philosophy there and
you’ll be on the road to success
in no time
having hopped over from
the road to nowhere
(where you’ve been for
a while now).

and boy, have we got a fix
for you.

put the front glass down
and don protective eye-ware
then cruise these streets
like a badass in a badass
car.
foldable front windshields
don’t win the favor of the ladies,
but leather flying helmets
and bottle-cap glasses earn
the envy of the idiots
(your target audience).

put the front glass down
and don protective eye-ware
in the rain like you own
this street. smile like
the cold doesn’t chill you to
your bones because you’re already
much too cold inside.

cruise these streets like
a badass in a badass car
because the shops are closed,
your friends are all at home
but your pipe is firmly
planted between your teeth
and you own this street

like when standing in the eye of the
tornado is silent
in a deceptive way.
deceptive like a woman with it’s beauty
and seductive powers.

i wrote a poem twenty lines long
with repetition, alliteration,
and a few other fancy elements.

but then in a move so poetic,
my words can’t describe

i erased it because it sucked
and saved you the pain of reading rubbish.

nothing of note
just a few thoughts
you shared i wrote
down because of their
poetic nature.
your speech was beautiful.
your main points?
not so much.

yea this old thing?
this napkin from the diner
where we sat to discuss
life but really you just ranted
against your friends,
politics, and everyone else
you blame.

just a napkin with some
scribbles.
nothing of note.
just a few thoughts
you shared and their
poetic nature.

a brief interlude
(a break if you will)
will now be taken
to give the actors
a break for a few moments
as they re-adjust to
life outside of their
character.
to kiss their girlfriends
instead of their in-play
wives.
to use the bathroom facilities
because opera with the
tension of diarrhea is less
than enjoyable for the singer.
thus the interlude.
we apologize for the break.

it’s that time of night
where the night before
you didn’t really sleep
worth beans
and you’re still up
because of that thing
you don’t need to do
but have no power over
yourself to keep yourself
from doing it
and you’re dreaming of
writing something long
and valuable and worthy
of your fingers hitting
the keyboard
but you know it’s too
late for coherent beautiful
words and so you settle
for something much much
less. something like a
rant where your sole
goal is a column of words
nearly uniform in size
but even that you
fail at in several
lines. but seeing your
comfort in failure you
resign yourself to bed.
and sleep comes, but much
too slowly.

idea swapping
behind every vaulted wall
but that’s where it ends.
they all got here with lofty
goals, dreams of change.
but they stay after selling
their souls, minds, hearts,
for power, prestige, foolish
green sheets of paper which
bring them no joy. no peace.
no change.

the sophistication that comes
with a pipe
will come to me
tonight

for that brief moment of
simple beauty in the
midst of the blinding
chaos

and i’ll give you my right arm
for a slice of fried chicken
wrapped in a tortilla and downright
delicious.
but as i’m offering it
i’m finding it increasingly unlikely
my right arm will help you purchase
chicken of any variety…
let alone fried.

my left leg on the other hand [sic]….

francis was whacked today.

i lost a toy i’ve loved since
childhood. a small green frog
stuffed with sand given to me
by a friend in sixth grade as
i walked out the door to move
a lifetime away and return much
too late for our friendship
to remain. i miss that toy
and the memories it’s always
represented, but that seems so
trivial now. as

francis was whacked today.

God give me the strength to
open my mouth when necessary
speak truth when needed
and to seal my lips when
i’m dying to speak but it’s anything
but useful.
and the wisdom to know the difference

(five more days
till the weekend)
as a kid i hated mondays
weeks dragged on for
years and weekends passed
in minutes.

school was perpetual
boredom with fascinating
social interaction for
minutes at breaks
recesses, and lunch times.

i’d do it again just to watch
who would sit with who. to understand why
baxter was the most popular
boy in sixth grade just because
he had hit puberty a full two years
earlier than the rest of us.

school was perpetual
boredom with fascinating
social interaction every day
i “forgot” my homework.
teachers watching students defy
authority.

student government….
(probably doesn’t deserve
a line of note)

i’d do it again just to watch.

now (five more days
till the weekend)
and my only fear is not being
bored enough this week.

general examples
compromise
especially from the past
with civil religion
existentialism
lobotomized historically
pruned
lost in its absolutes when it was
sentimentalized

in balding i’ve found myself
at midlife crisis wondering
when and where i’ll find a hat
which will cover my head
shield the sun
and make me look like a
non-jackass

blue on the walls
on your lips
(cuz you’re weird)
on your shirt
as a flower
on a pin
you paid for with
green
on your shoes (laces)
in the corner
as a plant makes
you feel
grey
like your eyes
not quite blue
and definitely
not green

hank was probably
his name

i guess so because
of the 4 inches of
buttcrack (3 more than
plumber regulation)
visible between
his wranglers
and his wife-beater