the tank parked in the driveway
tells a story that we know too well
but parties on a Friday night
just seem to swing and swell until
the house’s beams burst through the seams
and timmy’s lost but there’s no well
and we can’t hear the shouts and screams
so turn the tables up a bit
the tank’s been idling all night long:
I guess we’ll never call it quits

the sieve and the sand hit 2000 posts today (just now thanks to my help), which on my recollection is about 1998 poems. Thats a buttload of poetry (please don’t get hung up on the semantics of the word, the truth is a boat probably can hold substantially more than a butt – that, however is why this is a poetry blog, because words are inherently more awesome than just words and a buttload IS more than a boatload even though physically cramming a whole boatload into a butt is probably nothing more than fodder for a sieve poem).

the point is, the group of gentleman(women) who have been writing for the sieve have each grown substantially more talented over the nearly two years since the blog began. and its about time we get some recognition. my plan for this recognition is two fold.

1) we do nothing and sit around like a good artist should, sucking our thumbs, rocking in fetal positions in the corner wondering when someone ‘important’ is going to report us to the Atlantic Monthly at which point one of us (obviously the most talented one – whom i shall leave unnamed as though it’s all obvious to each of us who that is) will receive a large book deal and probably a poet laureate for some second-class first-world nation and then invite the rest of us to lunch – inevitably leading to our fame and wealth etc etc….

and: (I know these seem mutually exclusive but again, don’t get hung up on the semantics)

2) somehow garner more fans for our lovely website on facebook and hope to spread the word that way or through twitter or something of the sort. we need to brag more. or at least just write more about how awesome we genuinely think the sieve is because it is awesome. not always. i’ll admit that i spit out more crap poems than most of you combined, but it leads to the occasional brilliance. and this blog has always been more about being prolific than be proficient. and then this brilliance grows with time and our crap to brilliance ratio has slowly but dramatically grown in favor of brilliance

this is a good thing.

now the sieve and the sand has risen to the top of awesomeness (there is a scale, we are at the top, directly above chuck norris and penut butter in a tube) and since there is no digg.com for poetry (please someone out there get on it) we have no way of being regularly recognized as invincibly awesome as we are except through the help of wordpress’ occasional promotion to the top of the poetry section via computer algorithm.

i’m rambling.

gentlemen. we are the giants. we bare the shoulders on which the greats have stood. and i for one am going to take this sitting down.

writing.

on my computer.

regularly.

because i effing love writing poetry.

thank you for joining me. lets bring the sieve to 3, 5, and 10 thousand in glory.

who’s with me?

minority enrolled
football injury
expelled

these cough drops hardly ease the pain
you put me through you put me through
I’ll never understand again
or talk to you or talk to you
I hear excuses day and night
it never seems quite worth the fight
I really only want to be
just a bit less confused
but really I just feel I need
to talk to you, to talk to you

you have no clue at the fire
that exists within these bones
as your eyes systematically
pan over the room, unfocused,
and you see me in the booth
by the window setting silver-
ware down for more ungrateful
customers to fill themselves
with, no.
you don’t have an incling.
i could, and would, run
a triathalon ten times the
speed of your rugged 6 foot
lumbering male counter-
part, the one who attracts
you so with his mind and his
faith;
if only, for a brief while,
i could heat the air
around your skin with
the truth smoldering within
my firey bones.

Ashamed you ought be! Asking any self respecting

Bard to fulfill an assignment such as this merits no other response! How may

Creativity be truly depicted when forced, shoved if you will, into a set of rules?

Do you lack the respect deserved of the authors of great arrangements of words into towering

Edifices of genius into the un-

Fathomable minds of dreaming mortal men living eternally through ageless legacy? Of

Grievances there are many for you, not your ten fingers, nor your toes may count them.

Heave your penitence on your bib, like a child, and ask to be cleaned of it!

If only you could see the true beauty of each jewel of anti-prose. No

Jello composition of assortments of letters can be

Known as creativity. If you want ingenuity, you need words of meaning, depth.

Laughter is my rage for such an insult, and how I laugh and scream and hoot and howl!

May creativity be inspired in your swirling pool of molded thoughts and birds fly from

Newly made nests of these twigs to create a fine idea, a diamond

Out of coal. I ask you this – Do you feel some

Pleasure in this deviously crafted injustice you bring upon me?

Quite some nerve you possess to inquire of belittling the powerful spirit I do possess.

Reveal a truly astonishing request for each student to compose a piece and

Suspect may be a position you could relieve yourself from, saving that no ambushes be

Tactfully planned by you in expectation of these “requests”.

Undulating waves of imagination may be conceived if you provide them with

Vitality to nurse them like suckled infants, and the aromas of the sweat on your brow

Will be sweet in the satisfaction that your toils are over. But for now you have studying to do!

Xylography is an art in which the blade must be honed, and poetry requires equal aptitude and un

Yielding attention if truly understood. The ultimate culmination of these truth is a

Zenith of absolution. May the zephyrs of inspiration fill your meddling mind…

words are more inspiring
when composed of seemingly
random pictures
rather than strokes of
alphabets.

letters aren’t beautiful unless
strung together and altogether
forgotten in the meaning
they create

our eyes graze by them
seeing words
not fugly letters

hoping meaning wont dissapoint

Sure, that walk
ain’t so bad
but a block and a
half through two
feet of snow in
tennis shoes
still makes wet
feet

Of course, if it’s
a walk back home
you can always
change your socks
to dry ones

Existence has been ripped
to shreds
all decadence, been torn
asunder
all the worriers put
to bed
coroners sliding back
their covers
clockwork clicking near
to dead
comfort pillows now to
smother
remember what the wise
men said
we’ve lost ourselves but
found eachother

a perfectly round pot
with nary a spout
holds in my rare oolong
so tea can pour out

the soft purple sand clay
on hand crafted shelf
brings me joy in the way
i bring it myself

big red robe they still call it
the emperor once drank
now passed down through the ages
that i may partake

I love bright mornings
cold air bites,warm bricks glow orange
day breaks over me

When you finally arrive, please let me know.
Let me know that you made it.
(At least when you think you’ve made it.)
When you’ve found success and meaning—
Wholeness.
I’d love to know when reach that place
But there’s this uncanny intuition
That’s telling me you never will.
But if you ever do make it on your own,
Without the help of someone much greater
Than yourself – you let me know.
I’ll be waiting (forever.)