Author Archives: Damian Garside

JUST EMPIRE

JUST EMPIRE

a just Empire
has there even
been such
a thing?
show me its Forum
and I’ll show
you it’s Colosseum
and other great gifts
to a peaceful people

show me
your just Empire
and I’ll
make a documentaty
duck the
necessary survelliance
circumvent
the censorship

tell it how it is, let
the descendants of
the founding fathers
have their
    moment to extol
explain

the force that binds
that holds together
      builds the roads
the naval fleets

gentle Sith, ultimate
order gurus in the Star Wars
legacy
      know that force,
believe in the potency
that it instills

and their right
to share it
      if not with the Universe
than at least
  with the world

ABOUT GAZA

ABOUT GAZA

I wanted to
talk to you
about Gaza

because there
is so much confusion
about where you stand

you fill my head
with all these poems
so much
    poetry

no use to anybody
poems that all those
who proclaim themselves
your most beloved

would say, do not
bear analysis, are
not worth the reading
are the product
of your antithesis
are openly blaspheming

and they are right
of course they are right

no point in my
attacking them, sanitizing them
throwing the proverbial
poetic kitchen sink
at them

in the name of the children
their shells
and bombs
    are maiming, killing

IN BED

IN BED

in bed
thinking of fairy tales

bed being
best place for
any kind of fairy
tale

inclusive of
child, adult and
seriously classified ones
the ones that
reveal
   the wicked witch is
not dead (reports of
her demise
strategically exaggerated) and Empire is
          forever always naked
just  trick of
the light
        and indoctrination that
goes by the name
of education

that we see
     what we believe:
Empire and Emperor
(its pure
    embodiment) is always
richly attired
  and powerfully adorned

no fear that this change
because fairy tale is the
dream of
all that abides
       supremely happy ever after

above history
beyond change

BETWEEN

every city
is another city

the other city
being how that city
is dreamt
how it
     dreams itself

every city struggles
to separate reality
from dream

fudges the demarcation
so easy then
         not to be able
to avoid
slipping between

OVERLOOKED

OVERLOOKED

I awake
fresh from nightmare

lost my way in a city
of memory spiralling upwards
into the mountains
totally transformed beyomd
all that I
can remember
wanting
    to get home
needing to get home

but no sense of direction
as with every step
I climb higher
and higher
passing a giant cathedral
like structure, itself
like a mountain with
a trio of spires as
its peaks, its pinnacles

all the wonder
    I should feel submerged
by the fear

and no way of phoning you
because I am
out of reception, do
not have
your number
so far for you
to drive
      in the night to
collect me

your death three years ealier
somehow dream- forgotten
crucially overlooked
    

RUBBLE

RUBBLE

books were
my civilization
               not enough
have
they taughr me

but where are
the books to
be seen
to be found

in these cities of
sky high

demented aspiration
built upon
       rubble

and
     when one
of those towers somehow
happens to
fall

   teach me where to
find smooth smooth stones

midst all
       that dust and rubble

SLIVER

SLIVER

poem is a piece
of the heart, a sliver,
a part

poem is a shadow
of a shadow
of shadow itself

needle
in a darkling haystack
no way
to locate
the gist
of its spark

divine or
decisively physical

thing that
refracts, tries
its best to reflect
in the grace
of mosaic
sealed in sharp
mirror shards

poem is.

Tell all that is
out what
you can
of the in

this thing I am we you are
public private the terrain

of all
hope and despair

creature of light (said
to be) much
submerged
in own light