Author Archives: Damian Garside

SYSTEM

SYSTEM

and now I find
and now I find

gymnast and
syntagm
     are so intimate

anagrams
of each other

spooky action
     at linguistic distance

but what do I know
of such unique connection

all my lovers
        ghostly, some
actual ghosts

the dust of all
    that was desire questioning
my stridence

gives the idea
     puts me on notice

that it is
                   all simulation

and when you undress before me
in name only

getting the sweet syntax
     up and running

see what you are up to here
Mr Shakespeare or
Earl
    of Oxford

whatever you wish to go by
privately call yourself

spilling from Juliet’s lips
the philosopical truth of
                    a true rose

even if
a thousand years of cynicism
scepticism stands in its way

when you
        go inexplicable mystery
and wrap yourself around me

making us (yes, channeling you
Professor Noam Chomsky)
branches, leaves
       upon the same tree

graft taking
      we can grow now together

happy
     (who would not be) though
this all
     feels pre-planned: our
perfect simulation

ARTISAN BAND

ARTISAN BAND

I try to sniff out
poetry anywhere
and everywhere

omce I thought
a few flashes in
a band on the Reeperbahn
four working class guys
irreverent, cheeky,
full of irrepressible
young life

watched them
began to get excited, thought
I saw, felt poetry there

but they
were just getting better
tighter
   practice making perfect
as is the way with bands

some of their lyrucs
and harmonies suggesting
promise, revelation of something

a capturing of the heart
of rock
      and roll

but I must have been mistaken
projecting my hopes upon them

tough business, hope
they make it
      my artisan band

ENTIRE

ENTIRE

you have clocked us
and cluedoed us
and played
every
   game
with us

to see the world
through photoshopped eyes

to switch on that strobe light
good for interrogations

but not for
viewing from a divine perspective

all you have dehumanized
stripped of humanity
millions of God’s image

murdered
each, as your great book says,
a Universe entire

AND VANITY PRESS

AND VANITY PRESS

I am
all about death

and vanity
press

this i
(readily) confess
to
     both

    woman
and
       God

the chimes
in my head
            both essence
of poetry
but also
   cash register

and so I write
of holocaust and genocide
things that
        lately delight

if not
    why so tiny effort, huge
reluctance

to stop
    doing so?

the sound effects of
slaughter

    so much
one can do with them

FLOW KYLE

FLOW KYLE

go with
the flow Kyle

trust
your instincts
at least
feel
your instincts

develop
an instinctual feel

imbibe your book
your sheets
    swallow, digest
embody

then
   throw away

run with what you
are good at
true to
is burning
inside you

play come
   what may with
power
and way

release the huge
deluge of positive
carry
   the day

FOSSIL

FOSSIL

call me a fossil
but my eyes
are fixed like Medusa’s om
the clock that be
telling me
I got ninety
seconds to midnight

got me wondering
when midnight chimes
what in
    this fairy tale
gets deconstructed, what
gets utterly transformed

and me
    having to make my
own way, own
sorry way

        all the way back home
forsaking the regal palace

as it warps and
shape-shifts and dissolves

as the book instructs
on practically every page
of its
     dense, comple text

trapped between
such
    fiery covers
(colour

        in this instance
saying it all)

SUPER BOWL POEM


SUPER BOWL POEM

woke up
in time to hold off
on the SuperBowl result

worst fears confirmed when
I summoned up courage
to check

    yep Brock loves God
but Brock loves
Patrick Mahomes

(does not seem
to care much about
Head Coach Kyle Shanahan)

and at this
        juncture, out of the blue,
an unruly host of
archetypes made their move
wanted to stick
         around a bit, get
the lie
   of the land in the process
of passing through me

a mad mosaic it was
for a while

      many shapes and
sizes, manners and
demeanours

     jostling up against each other
(Brownian motion)
          excanging, debating,
doing their
dialectic dance, analysis
synthesis
no homogenizing

and there I was in a carnivalesque dream

chatting to the players in
St Francis’ kingdom
of those elevated
                    high above
the realms
of material wealth

peering into the abyss that
a philosopher cum psychologist
had laid
      before me

a tablet broken with the
entire script jagged

and there on the road
a burnt out humvee

and there in the docks
a rusting destroyer

archetypes at home within
settling
     for a game of solitaire

and me
thinking, wondering,
      who does have a
prophetic bone in this
my body

is winning everything?
    and if it is not

will there ever
indeed

      be an end to war?



KYLE AT CHESS

KYLE AT CHESS

After those blown
final quarters think
I should
   play Kyle at chess

across 64 white
black squares

he would
not be at his best

checking on
his playbook
instead of
analyzing the
board

fools mate, scholars mate,
smothered mate
      quick
into the pan
fried liver mate

one, two,
          three, West
Coast, East Coast
         Bobby Fischer
        (merciful) mate

he wouldn’t need to
worry about

the torture of
leading
       heading into an

       endgame, being
outmanouvered
            at the end

GIMME

GIMME

world’s
falling apart

little children
getting blown
to
   smithereens

so gimme that
sweet false consciousness
that would come
with a
    SuperBowl victory

don’t let Mahomes
spoil everything
with
    an insane overtime
charge

this after Kyle left
his best laid plans
in a briefcase
in the
    locker room

this is not
   the script I want,
I need

so write me a new one
bring me that
thick syrupy delusion
that a Niners’
Vegas victory
          would bring

the world falling apart
                         bits
of little
children

how come I always get
             caught this way

how come
I’m not
         so smart