Replacements

Replacements

The planted trees bud in the Spring,

misaligned on the compressed soil.

How will they adapt to the world?

Will their branches bend around the conductors

and angle in the local breeze,

or will they follow the swirling currents of heat

and electrical emotion?

Robert L. Jackson

Dyed

Dyed

Submerged,

my vision changes, 

the light refracts, 

and dreams compress.

The scaled prey

are leaner 

than they appeared

from the eroding bank.

My rubber hooves 

sink deep 

into the compost 

diffusing into the clear.

Through the tea 

I see a bitter horizon 

in the ice rubble

and the soaking leaves.

-Robert L. Jackson III

Broken Peaks

Broken Peaks

Everything is

a puzzle

made of the tight shards

of a shattered crystal.

The fragments have sharp edges

that cut the fingers

trying to place them

into their harbors.

At sweet angles

the planes reflect you

but when tilted

they become invisible.

Silent in the night

when touched too firmly

the lone geometries resonate

when nicked.

Robert L. Jackson III

Tangled

I am now posting my poems also on a new Facebook page. I invite y'all to join us here:

https://www.facebook.com/Drypineshumidteapoetry

Tangled

The stiff,

plastic coated metal bends

but does not intertwine

as readily as the clear,

thin, fishing line.

Blunt fingers 

can pry apart 

the rolling curves 

of cables, 

but are innocuous 

to the minuscule, 

tightly wrapped threads. 

The random interactions 

and coincidences 

of curving time

has brought the linear flow 

to this fuzzy spot, 

without direction, 

into fixed, solid orbits. 

Even the nimble surrender, 

to cut 

the growths loose 

rather than free them.

-Robert L. Jackson III

Air

Air

In the crowded room

at ten meters apart,

electrically,

we are separated

by a salty ocean

100,000 light years wide,

the diameter 

of the Milky Way's disk,

spiraling

with 200 billion stars.

However, if gazing across

an earthly ocean

we are separated

by not even an angstrom

of air,

and the particles

leap to touch

across the gaps of nothing.

-Robert L. Jackson III

Vision

Vision

Digital statues

gaze down 

at windows, 

but no landscapes 

lie beyond the glass 

covering reflective veins 

of pure silicon

falling into a grid 

without hierarchy 

and branching regeneration.

These contemporary visions 

evolved from crackling flames, 

to charcoal drawings, 

to indigo symbols, 

to electrical sounds, 

to pictures in light, 

to pure information.

Robert L. Jackson III

Misplaced Poem

This poem was found hiding in a unrelated folder in my office.  I am not sure when it was written, but it was a while ago.

Adventure

We shoot for stars
with air powered bb guns
and try to bend gravity
like the gods used to do.
Now those days are gone
with only traces left
at the exotic locale
of mythical rocks and legendary seas.
So we travel
to outer space
through the dreams of children
but not to Earth.
The destination is in question
when places do not exist.

Robert L. Jackson III