Five Poems by Edward Lee

 

FORGOTTEN

 

Petals of light

falling from the sun,

burn up in the atmosphere,

their melting heat

spreading across the Earth,

like an eager kiss

given by a forgotten lover

who wishes to no longer

be forgotten.

 

We close our eyes,

basking in its warmth,

our skin mutating,

turning us into some other

that remembers, somehow,

what that last kiss of heat

will be like, when

everything else is forgotten,

as everything must, eventually,

be forgotten.

 

 

 

 

THIS PLANT

 

By pure inaction 

I have attempted to kill

this plant on

the kitchen windowsill,

 

yet it survives,

as so little I haven't cared about has died,

as those things

I did care about

have not survived 

either.

 

A plant originally bought

to brighten a room

I no longer live in,

but one you still do,

my name missing 

from your mouth

for several months now,

perhaps your mind too.

 

 

 

 

STORM

 

I asked,

a lifetime ago,

for electricity to be flooded

through my brain,

to erase the oil-black dullness

that whispered sluggishly

of blood and wounded skin.

 

But I was refused,

for reasons I can no longer recall,

and now the dullness

has spread,

and the whispers

have become bone-breaking shouts,

 

and I stare at the sky

praying for a storm

full of light and roar. 

 

 

 

YOU LEFT AND LEFT YOUR LEAVING

 

If, when my masochist tendencies

get the better of me,

I look now

at those old photographs,

I can see the emptiness

in your smile,

the future deadness

in your eyes, those things 

I could not see,

or didn't want to see, maybe,

when I held you

in the reality

of my arms.

 

You knew what was coming,

knew you would leave me

in such a way

as to never leave me,

the unnecessary need

to look at old photographs,

simply proof

of my refusal to let go

of the past

in me,

 

that maybe you saw,

that maybe

speeded our journey's end,

your wish for a brighter tomorrow

greater than any other consideration. 

 

 

 

TO SING A LIFE

 

The tongue of the bell

is broken, its peals 

painfully silent

as it sways in the wind

driven by the lungs

of the fallen,

their blood turned to ice

in the cold generated

by those who would break

the tongues of bells

and silence the people who

need the sound of its song

to sing their life.

Edward Lee's poetry, short stories, non-fiction and photography have been published in magazines in Ireland, England and America, including The Stinging Fly, Skylight 47, Acumen, Lothlorien Poetry Journal and Poetry Wales. 

His poetry collections are Playing Poohsticks On Ha’Penny Bridge, The Madness Of Qwerty, A Foetal Heart, Bones Speaking With Hard Tongues and To Touch The Sky And Never Know The Ground Again.

He also makes musical noise under the names Ayahuasca Collective, Orson Carroll, Lego Figures Fighting, and Pale Blond Boy.

His blog/website can be found at https://edwardmlee.wordpress.com