Damian Garside

THIN AIR

Like Ophelia
he died small

a paltry few to mourn
barely a stone

above the grave they circulate
unclaimed constellations
we have not figured out
let alone
found a pattern, given
them names

he put in the excruciating time
the hard learning
no lost to history, genius
savant
for whom we have to
concoct such a narrative
stretch creative fiction
to
its breaking point

oh that something so
miraculous, universal.
could be the deepest lie
complete travesty

where in our entire history
was such greatness
plucked out of
nowhere

flirt the the idea that
it was there for the taking,
be pulled
from the shadows

no greater alchemy
sucked out of thin air

BOMBWISE

bomb me
bomb them
bomb yourself
bomb

everything you hate
anyone you like

bomb
guided
bomb standoff

bomb
in peace, bomb
to start a war

bomb cruelly
bomb kindly
bomb to eviscerate
bomb to liberate

bomb up and down
and all around
every which way and wise

UP TO SCRATCH

when I arrived in Hell
was stunned to find
the place empty
the only
evil soul there

so to kill a bit of eternity
the devils and I played pool
sank some beers
discussed the state
of the world
and humanity
from a left-wing perspective

marking time for the torturers
to ready their equipment
the inquisitors in
Hell’s hierarchy
to stoke their fabled fires

get my suffering
up to scratch

RENAISSANCE

then did the tree cascade

burst into fruit

a poem, two,
three even there
to be
found
on every leaf

none of them great, none
very good

it has to be said
(or perhaps just whispered)

BLESS

BLISS

here I am
conjugating the verb “blister”

where after
took a trek to the zoo
to escape (Mama taboo)
the schtick I was
taking in the zero point
quantum field

and you in your G string
playing the devil’s chord
entertaining
string as your
theory of everything

blitz attack it were
(forgive my dialect) when
you came
to seduce me

our ramshackle bits
that we might juxtapose
somewhat
surreal or
even psychedelic

shipwrecking me in the tropics
slave to fat climates

exercising your leverage
haughty in the knowledge
that woman
is subroutines, is
ex machina, is Grecian
statuesque chemical
factory
cosmic comedy, existential
tragedy
disjunction waiting
to happen

lured into those gardens
sheer abyss of bliss

fusion
is out there beyond the borderlands
of anything
possible

time beyond time if
we could but find it

place of riddle and parable
stamped in the image
of all that
ventures with trajectories

that
(for want of wings demonic
or distinctly angelic)
is suffered to stumble, crawl,
shuffle, hop and swing

sharp and lithe end
somewhere between
plain
writing stylus and hi-
tec Nile
crocodile

OR SO YOU BELIEVE

déshabillé
(or so you believe)

whereas I would say
too much is divulged
subtext is showing

paradigm so exposed
to the ruination of your reputation

need a cover up
heads to
spin

though my own stock-
in-trade be
scarcely golden

seems like you may just
have rushed too pre-
cipitously into
some bad
media alchemy

and now
are looking high and low
under every bombed structure
for each
and every collateral

making such a racket to
deflect our eyes
from the hypocrisy

the place
reduced to a desert
carnage
beyond words

sad that what might have
served poetry
bent out of shape to
sustain
the war industry

defend
death’s exceptionally

make the case for a rapture
thing so sickly sweet

will
annihilate the need for
theology
morality, humanity

basic kindness and love
the species professed to hold dear

TAIPAN

I do hope
these feeble offerings

meet expectations
blend in with perceptions

fit the ruling algorithm
work wonders in the wash
with
every colonial.mindset
under the Sun,
the skin-cancer Sun
likely to play havoc
with the
shade of our species

need to hit this one
not just out
of the park
but across the entire outback
(mustn’t
come boomeranging back
in any size shape or form)

or return
with that sour vomit reflux
that you
people antipodean
have just way too
many synonyms for

and so
as you see by my references
and appendix certification

I have not only
chosen wisely and well
but have measured every
word, graphene,
syllable using
precise laser alignment
and most exact
of micrometers

have filtered via pipette
to withhold any residue

what is left
should be
immune to distaste,
inoculated against deep scrutiny

unless somewhere in
the nature of the whole toxic
chemistry
produced a venom more
troublesome than
that of
the inland taipan itself
.

PLASMA (POEM FOR CARLOS SANTANA)

say it was gradual
no big bang but
some
kind of inflation

whereupon in this
fable
gas clouds gravity
stars
plasma

hydrogen helium
smorgasbord of elements

and you
subject of
every song

Muse of
every meditation

you every delicious atom
of your loveliness
from
an entirely different star

Oh baby
reminding me tonight
of that crucible
perfect furnace

and then
soul, word,
music

constellation
gnosis between galaxy
upon galaxy

ocean upon ocean

you wrestling with that
red python
on the Woodstock stage

(if you don’t mind me saying so)
cosmos coursing through you

KINO YVES

Yves
you swallow continents
pedalful at a time

expending more energy
than the whole of Europe
(no wonder
you eat so ravenously
and with such
miraculous delight)

Morning you guys. Let’s
get going Onward to Lusaka!

moon buggy astronaut of
the whole of
Africa
Emperor of handshake
in his slowly slowly chariot
of joie de vivre

“are you
for real?” they ask him
and
he does alter perceptions
pre-define reality

inexorably, beautifully
edging your way down to
Cape Town

bringing
out the best in us

all of South Africa it seems
waiting for you

screeching to an ecstatic emphatic halt

when, to their total belief
they see you, catch you,
pass you
dodging through Mother
City traffic

munching lunch
in their neighborhood

his little candle bringing
light to
us all

slowly, exquisitely slowly, guys,
wending its way
from France to
Agulhas

cape of needles, furthest point
South where
oceans meet

PLACE OF WORSHIP

I achieved
my spot

in this place of worship
found a pew to myself

unlike the time
when they had locked the door

had singled me
out for exclusion, railed
from the pulpit

my face published
in the prescriptions
nailed to the wooden door

silly me
to overreach
not to comply, my soul
(so young) still
deeply
wed to chaos, disorder,
anarchy

anything that reeked
of liberation

schism
with blind authority