Some Poems by Robert J. Tiess © 2019
Submitted for Writer's Digest Poetry Prompts
For my AllPoetry.com poetry / contest submissions, please follow this link.
THE "GREAT" EXPERIMENT
Double-blind
beyond control:
within this test
no answer's key.
Discriminate
and fail at once.
Defer US to
equivalence
saving data
from defilement
so no result
contends a cause.
Ignorance
for science, fear,
because bias
is pariah here.
LOVE AS FUNCTIONS
function love(another)
{
return another + 1;
}
function unrequited()
{
return 0;
}
function compassion(awareness)
{
sympathy = awareness ^ 2;
return sympathy;
}
function selfLove()
{
selfLove();
}
function agape(everyone, everything)
{
return everyone * everything;
}
Unfair?
Unfair, some might say,
such wealthy trees must give up
their gold to autumn.
Oceans know better:
the skies they cannot grasp were
not meant to be owned.
FOUR ENCOUNTERS IN THE WOODS
Evergreens await
the first stars; the harvest moon
passes sans fanfare.
Falling leaves abscond
with streams, forsaking forests for
one last rush of life.
Deer beside a bridge
stare (amused?) while, slow, I slog
through wet, heavy snow.
Cardinals charge by:
red past black and white, through gray:
solemn, shrill, impelled.
THE HOLDING OF NOTES
She cannot carry notes so long
you bet
but yes she will, and longer more:
forget
everything you've heard before
and let
her lyrics lift you where she soars:
duet
for dream and soul, sky and mind,
reset
your hardened heart to hear without
regret
to savor endlessness through song
sunset
without swearing days are through
but yet
beginning as she breathes each phrase:
onset
of sustaining grace - such music few
have met.
FIVE MILD SURPRISES
Without aim? A blonde
leaf leaps, lands in your long hair
as you dream of trees.
Before these leaves fell
we did not expect to find
all those riven limbs.
One could presume ice
would melt on such a sunny
noon as this - but watch!
A bear stares, jolts back:
mirrored eyes, dazed because it
knew not its own face.
The nest of fledglings
vacant now that they can fly:
sweet songs sung elsewhere.
PERFECT WORDS
Should we wait for perfect words?
This golden moment does deserve
nothing less than expression's best.
So what do you say? Tell me then
through eyes and smiles, gentle moves
as smooth as sonnets through the air:
your gaze an essay musing truth
those fingers flexed with eloquence
grazing where no phrase can reach
that flawless talk two bodies mouth
when minds surmount all mortal speech.
DEPTHS
Cousteau could not dive such depths:
your waves which break my silence down
the undercurrents of your eyes
the whirlpool in your hidden heart
the sunken treasures of your truths
which lift this deluged ship of dreams
to sail again before your breath
discovering another land
by the compass of your hand
- a navigation never taught
before the shores of shallow thought
this ocean that you are to me
your fathomless profundity.
SURVEYING
Boundaries demark the way:
subtle slopes beyond the bend
trending trench before the bank
fence defenseless from the wind
inclinations toward a line
defining features on a map
delimiting some property:
a pencil sketch at best, you see,
until the world again decides
it has had enough of walls
and shrugs the structures
from its shoulders, brings us back
before no border dared to be
once the world was wide and free.
TEN
Ten stairs to the scope
where the cosmos reveals its
secrets in this cold.
Ten stars at first, then
hundreds more as minutes pass;
now we see our breath.
Ten hours more until
sun obscures the universe
and we feel our hands.
Ten days after, we
perceive what we did not sense
that December night.
Ten months later, our
thoughts would walk beyond the stars,
talk of autumn leaves.
Ten years hence, our hearts
blaze by space and time: unbound
this seasonless love.