Author Archives: Damian Garside

MEASURE

MEASURE

measure this poem
give it substance
give it
a location

somewhere in that
relativized field
of space slash time

slash everything you
have ever read your
brain is filtering through
to bring
you ready to go
find , see yourself
in this quintessential moment

as for me
I will just look back
on the process
that brought
me here
put me on
this page

a ghostly presence
a whispered voice
a teasing
play of
sound and sense

only clue
to you
    I may have
found my way
to drop a
hint
of life,
suggestion of
touch

put
this as
hypothesis
of length and breadth
and depth
and time

somewhat
transparently
before you

OH FOR AN ODE

OH FOR AN ODE

Oh for an ode right now
a long sprawling melodious
poetic artifact

one to rival those
I do know, especially
Shelley’s West Wind
which I guess
is up to its tricks
this night
blowing across
a pitch black Atlantic
making the surface
of those giant waters
most unruly indeed

today
   what is blowing in from
the West shrieks of
chaos and nemesis
breathes an
air of apocalypse bringing
promise of
divinely mandated
horror and fire

and death
let us not forget death
a demanded
death sacrifice
being the death of us all

and with
     death of the word
death of belief, hope
for true transformation
that destroyer
is indeed preserver,

cleansing the heart
as it wipes the slate clean

Oh for an ode right now
ode that
keeps
      writing itself

line after line
strophe, antistrophe,
permutations of
form and expression

radical new
structures

revision after revision
layer upon layer

the wind
    feeding these lines,
giving breath, providing energy

on the page
at my window
no end in sight.


ON THE RIGHT SIDE

ON THE RIGHT SIDE

and so, Peter, we hear
you hauled ass to the Vaticanto confer with the other Peter,
or at least his current avatar

saw you heading to the basilica
swallowing as much incense
smoke as I, as
humble mortal,
would not have thought possible

strange, because it
is thermonuclear war you
worship not
anything low grade chemical

all that death and ovlivion
untold suffering
      exactly believed to
be the engine
of history and
will of God

concern for light and humanity
the stuff of the anti Christ.
province of the Devil

thanks to you
    (yes i feel I really must
thank you)

I know now with perfect clarity
exactly where I stand,
which
     book, which
allegory
tells me
the truth about
the side I am on.


FULL ON SMART SURREAL

FULL ON SMART SURREAL

Don’t have to look far
to find my demon

suddenly across the canyon
strange lyrics and novel tunes

out of nowhere
without warning
springing up out
of the ground
shooting stars and
wonder icons

something in the air
crazy chemistry at work

but
   what we thought
a revolution was nothing
but a script, a
screenplay, an orchestrated
operation

set up
to be demolished, vaporize
before our eyes

and we too Siren songed too
fractured to the core
to march
          to that huge house
rearrange more
than just
the furniture

so much about this
so ultra psyops
psychedelic

so Helter Skelter all fall
down and all die young
you
    did
against the odds
you cool mushrooms

my heroes
            now so of
a sudden
miles down river

a whole generation, my
generation
played,
       duped
taken in

so
   beautiful
a conspiracy

none ever so
full on smart surreal 

my demon
     in agreement

DARK POEM

DARK POEM

some dark poetry
here for you

brooding, sinister:
I wrote it with
my left hand

stretching everything,
present company included,
beyond prior limits

this being a time
for bleak material
without parallel
beyond
comparison,
like none other

would have
clinched the deal
if
   desperate to leave you
flooded by a deluge
of dark insight

I had been able to expand
everything, stretch
things out
to an
ultimate dead end

leaving you with
a parting comment that
could not
be more
conclusive, ultimate,
horribly definitive

HOW

HOW

how may I awaken
when still locked
into the dream
that is
beautiful death

dreaming my love
for you
loving
the dream of you?

we touch, we consume,
believe as souls
we have become
one, are
now tethered together

but
    where to
after this ecstasy, our
bodies fulfilled, spirits
unable
to soar
    too reticent
to fly

towards, away from,
all that we believe we
know, all that we
know
   we believe we require?

CHILDREN OF OUR TIME

CHILDREN OF OUR TIME
“Like the Grateful Dead”
              “HAIR” (1979)

Children of our time
that time
             run its course
we
run our course (well,
almost)

but not before
we made our mark,
         went discovering, opened
up, had our fun
had the hair
              (mine all
gone)

whatever it was
    love, poetry, sex, politics,
community, cosmos, peace,
dope (and more
love
wherever possible)

we tried to
rock with it, be like stars,

Children of our time, whatever
they say today
(so fallen
     from grace flat on
their faces)

nothing like us
they just don’t make
                  our like
anymore.