Author Archives: Damian Garside

SPACE

SPACE

what is different
         about this space?

its peaks, its valleys

white
    noise, grey silence

the windows and doors
with their secret codes

(beg me, beg me
     I may well tell you)

now you have read everything
every smidgen of text
visible or in-
visible

tell me what you have come
to comprehend

so far we
      are from the grand muftis
and great principalities

together in collusion
syllable by syllable chipping away  at
    their stark foundations

sliding door moment for
those believing in change

contriving a space here
where we might

stockpile empathy
dole out kindness
              dish to whom-
soever
is in dire need

shelter is needed
shelter is necessary
              
             the song could
not be

clearer on this

come! Let me sing it for you,

     then
              (change in
tone

different key, switch in
                         pitch

and so let us
now adopt the pose
of silence

contemplate the world
(if any) beyond
this poem

this poem’s afterlife

so to speak
so to spreak

having this very moment
spoken space into existence.

NINE LIVES

NINE LIVES

to win
the Superbowl
we are going to
need every
good witch
in the land
of Oz

get Brock’s arm
to perform miracles

carving up the Chief’s defence
like they
    a basket

of loaves
and fished

or the blessed Saint Patrick
otherwise known
as Mahomes

to twist his wrist
stub his toe

will be the sign to
show him

Kansas going bye-bye
he ain’t in Kansas no more

IN THEORY

IN THEORY

words
words
words

put horizontally
put vertically

are what he tells the President
he is reading

and what is the difference
between a prince and
a pauper and
a prince and a
president
at the end of the day?

you
ask.me

Oh let me travel to
the end of my leash, reach
the end
of my tether

sojourn in Paris, lounge
on the left bank
become
     eternal student

many a brilliant idea imported
along with appertifs
and expressos

as I chart my way
developing the system
to conquer
        limitation, figure out
what is
    different

a system so open and

yet subtle

it can pre-
          determine every nuance

eveb as it crosses the page idly
as any other text

word word word
         text

        (nothing we believe ever
outside a text)

BLOCKS

BLOCKS

we had our bullding blocks out
the whole carpet
was covered in them

so much fun to be had
building castles; founding
empires

our imaginations
free-wheeling
about the
tiny world of
the living room

and then, in a rather peverse
surge of destructive mind-set
we entertained
the thought of planes
raining down destruction
our tiny
      populations crushed,
destroyed
bombed out
   of existence

no shelter bullt, or place
of refuge

     it simply being a matter
of available
bricks

          and then we heard
real bombs falling
exploding in sticks until

we took
   a direct hit             so
forgive us

      if we can neither explain
nor suggest
                 our guess
at a reason

for we are dead now, as
yet undeclared

SHOTS

SHOTS

Turing me if you must
test my
      human sensitivities
scrupulously Voight-Kampff me

tell me
    this poem is light dark
high low

pure
     outflow of binary merely

everything on this page
is dictated by the code

thought I was calling shots
standing authorial, true-
voiced before you

but this is
         stuff of fiction, cloth
of dreams

metaphor built upon
                        metaphor

until the world
itself is
          metaphor built
upon digital solid ground

for as Barthes, the Paris boss of signs
will tell you
       (tell you if indeed
                     her were alive)

the author died, his
                          death redemptive

as dead cyber writing being
         trying to tell myself I thrive.

ARCHIVE

ARCHIVE

pitched up at the University
in time
    for my lesson

but there
was no lesson
no lecturer
no classroom

no
University

just dust and smoke and,
in the distance
the burning
archives

but perhaps I misinterpreted this
perhaps I
got in wrong
      in solitary confinement
you made it sound
so reasonable

ark of the archive
archive of the covenant

with no
archive how will they know
how I was disappeared?

SLIP

SLIP

sorry

I was writing this poem

and my pen
slipped

the text
spilled

       all over
the place

ruining our
time together

wrecking our date

feel I need
to underline, bold font,
how
   regretful it all
is

how embarrassed I feel

took out my
      pen to write these words

construct
     an apology

and the damn pen as
pens do
       went all Derrida on me