Poetry: Selections from Edward Lee

SOMEONE SAID IT GETS EASIER, BUT NO, NO

 

The countless deaths

one must endure

just to live, that

make the living

that much harder

when in fact it should be

getting easier,

the sweetness turned bitter

amongst the odour of decay

clinging to our skins

like an unwanted promise

made in the night

that threatens never to end,

no never, not even when an end

finally arrives.

MY LOVE FOR YOU

 

My love for you

is a lifetime

in a day,

each lifetime

stretching longer

with every passing day.

MEANING

 

I am waiting

for something to happen,

without doing anything

to make that something happen;

 

this is the beginning

of my ending,

this lying down

in wait for a day that ends

without becoming a night,

or another day.

 

This is

as it is,

and I know it is,

and still I lie here,

waiting,

 

betraying myself

and all I was placed

on this earth for.

PERHAPS

 

Every morning

we wind our world,

rush through our

separate days

so we might return

to our shared rooms,

before the world

runs down,

 

fall into each other

as it grinds

to a pleasurable stop,

tell ourselves

this is all worth it,

and perhaps it is,

or perhaps not.

WITNESS

 

The took my witness statement

before the act

I witnessed,

then expected me,

in a court of a law newly shaped,

to swear that it

was the truth

and the truth whole,

nothing more or less,

 

even had me 

call into action

an entity falser

than my statement,

averted their eyes

at my reddened cheeks.

 

They hung the man

I had yet so see, 

shook my hand after,

commended my words

and my courage

though I had never felt

more like a coward.

 

They hung him,

then crucified him,

just to be sure,

then burnt all copies

of my statement,

even the one

planted in my mouth,

took my tongue with it,

called it an accident,

friendly fire.

 

They took his body down,

or what remained

after vultures

had their fill,

stowed it away somewhere

they won't reveal

until ten years after all

their own deaths.

 

By then I might be

still alive, my age 

decades behind theirs,

might have regrown my tongue,

might believe what

they had me write,

 

might not, though

I imagine I will always

remember the face

of the man they executed,

finally seeing him,

a stranger to me then,

a stranger to me now.

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, A Thin Slice Of Anxiety 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.