A Fevers of the Mind Poetry Showcase from Edward Lee

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, Fevers Of The Mind 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

YOU ARE SECURE INSIDE ME

You are a poem 
I could never write,
but would know by heart 
if ever I did,

yet it would be unfinished,
as you marvel me
and my heart every day,
a new line added
every night and secured
in my memory by morning.

TIME WILL TELL

The drive thru cinema
they flattened Golgotha for
has been demolished itself,
the land now zoned
for a museum
of panic and last chances
now that the realisation
we're the frog in the pot
has become apparent
and we can longer jump
as far as we once did, 
the years as unkind to us
as we have been to those 
very same years.

FINAL

Your final words
left deeper wounds
than the door slamming
on my fingers
as I reached to catch
your elbow 
as you left.

My fingers never healed properly,
nor did the wounds
your words made,
the truths and half-lies
contained within them,

and my heart,
alas my heart,
fell from my chest
and now resides
in some dark, 
forgotten corner
of a room
we were going to spend
a lifetime in, but now
houses someone else,
some stranger to all
that occurred between us,
though perhaps familiar
with the wounds that can come
from a love turned upon itself.

THESE RUMOURS AS TRUTHS

The maggots born
from the dead cat’s body
in the alley behind heaven
are growing feathery wings
and taking flight, carrying 
believable rumours
that all is not well
beyond the pearly gates,
decay nothing more than a trick
coined by the unbelievers
doomed by their unbelieving.

SELF-LOVE

How quickly self-love
can become self-hate,
the world outside the window
living a better life
without breaking a sweat,
as you do
with stapled ladies
and digital tits,
the effort,
more times than most,
far outweighing
the little result
your wasted body
can manage.