Damian Garside

DO SHEEP

DO SHEEP? do sheep dream of electric androids? last night I dreamt of the temple of the high abbatoir scouting out which I circumvented the butchery in the dark, dense forest perfect place (as opposed to a desert) for such slaughter to be hidden place where two and two make five or will do if they tell you it does

FRIEND

FRIEND the monster sat in the dock council for the defence tried his hardest to gaslight the jury need not have worried not have worried monster after monster parachuting in from everywhere overran the court room left with their rescued friend

SUPPRESS

SUPPRESS Suppress all those voices we do not want cannot bear anything that is rational, empirical, logical, poetical grounded in the real life critical context of struggling human beings take away those songs and stories that ask us, plead with us, implore us to, insist that we take an altered perspective, see the world differently listen to what the other side has to say God forbid! Leave us to our solid faiths, our complete beliefs which we are determined to persuade you of fair or foul whatever it takes human beings are meant to believe not to think are meant to follow not to lead meant to serve be no ways be free be gaslit to think there’s is the best of lives than can possibly be summit of our cynicism sublime stupendous hypocrisy.

RIDE

RIDE a thought experiment: imagine we are in a parallel universe where there are no thought experiments no leap of faith analogies where Einstein was a plodder without the imagination to extend parameters, push envelopes, explode paradox and we all stuck in the old Isaac Newton prison of cast-iron space and time yes this is my little poetic thought experiment happy you joined me as here we hit light speed everything now counter-intuitive about this ride

FLOW

FLOW I came because of cash flow problems, ended up on the river which must have had a sacred meaning once despite being the colour of stewed tea but we all had a nice lunch — correction, everyone had a sensational lunch but me taking a turn for the worse tottering off to the tiny aft toilet (adding to the discoloration of the waters no doubt) Oh life, against the current, can be a harshly blended mixture. And me here because of matters of terminally negative cash flow not so everwhere: here houses big as colleges whose manicured gardens sweep down in lush green to the river’s edge and here is one strikes my fancy as an African replica of the Palace at Versailles lost in wonder for a moment of breathtaking economic speculation (Marx on the Moselle) but then time to go home the boat turned around. Post-lunch the workshop am here to facilitate running softly downhill.

BATTLEFISH

BATTLEFISH

you thought
sea is for fish
but I know
it’s for battleships

if you cannot
see this

you know
nothing of religious narrative

nothing of the supreme
design and plan

COMPULSION

COMPULSION locked and loaded driven and compelled all in lock-step all doing your part to make this truly obscene sometime if there is hope and guilt and shame to be found you will be returned to the pain doubt and uncertainty of your best humble selves without which you will never come to assess how you let your last shred of humanity kill itself in an orgy of murder turned ecstatic joy

AT ROME

AT ROME

they look back
longingly at Rome
whose triremes ruled
the Mediterranean

whose legions kept
control over
much of the
known world

whose slaves rebelled
and were crucified
along the entire
length
of the Appian Way

by the monstrously
rich General, Marcus Crassus

who would come to
be captured by the Parthians
and fed molten gold

DEAD DOG

DEAD DOG

Truth is a
dead dog

let it rot, let
it putrefact
let it smell
let
it stink

don’t let them bury it
hide or celebrate
the fact
it is dead
with their complicity
by their agency

don’t let them cover
it will concrete or
a brass plaque
build a mausoleum
a cenotaph
the mother
of all monuments

give speeches in its
praise, celebrate its
former life

for if truth is dead
there are no lies
no duplicity
no hypocrisy.

so
dead or not let
them not

bury truth

let it lie where they slew it
let it stink.

DRAGON

DRAGON

year of the Dragon, sign
of Aquarius

my robot took me out
fishing for nebulae

being a sort-of poet
I will sort-of try to convince
you we did
not return home unlucky

the fish that we caught
though lacking old sci fi fins
pleaded to
be returned to the cosmos
in pure mathematics

and songs, such sad songs,
that took us through
all the universally audible
and inaudible harmonies

such strange
outlandish scales, she commented
as she and I
calculated what to do
with such a freshly caught
specimen of piscean
intangibility

year of the Dragon, sign
of Aquarius

we added
a new phenomenon
to our expanding collection