for the love of poetry.

Dear Readers,

the past week has been, in a phrase, overwhelmingly eventful, and the literature seminar that took place today was the best thing that happened in tkwek's life since the concerts on... thursday and friday. but that's beside the point, because the litsem provided tkwek with an

oasis.

in.

the.

desert.

and so, back from the break, tkwek's headed to free verse for once and composed this poem.

entitled "Secret"

i hope you enjoy it. the other two poems are little rhymes composed in 5 minutes during the workshop, where we had to make use of a specific list of words. 

and oh, wenrong, don't worry the music thing's coming soon. 

poetified.

The Straight Times Editor

Secret

Grandma, we have a secret.

 

you probably won’t remember it

now, but you told it to me on a crowded evening –

Chewing chicken bones in a jam-

packed Vietnamese restaurant. I knew –

 

you wanted to tell me something when I

saw you pause for a full ten seconds in the middle of

persuading me to change

my dietary habits.

 

you swallowed, no, gulped,

that mouthful of basil-passion soda and Told me

slowly, clearly, almost wistfully, but

suddenly in the voice of a rapturous girl that you wanted

your picture Drawn.

 

What picture, grandma?

 

I want you to

draw me, carrying

a long wooden pole –

you know, boy, the kind

with two baskets, one hung

on each end? – I’m squatting, no,

I think standing better. Standing, in a

field, a rice paddy field, with the blossoms

of luxurious green all around me. And boy ah,

you must show the white tips that hang on those

green stalks like effervescent edible pearls. In those

baskets you will draw my children – your father in one,

your aunty in the other one. And your father is wearing the

big round nighteeneightyfour specs that he always used to shove

unconsciously higher and higher up his nose-bridge when he studied.

and talking about nosebridges ah, boy, you must remember ah, your dad

had that hooked nose, he inherit from your – cough – grandfather one. Not

nice, I know, but still must draw. Your aunty leh, no hooked nose. Your aunty ah,

looked like me.

 

and so, grandma,

 

you told me your secret that night

that sacred key

of unraveling the mysteries

written in the creases of your time-worn skin, the words messier and

more streaked with emotion than my

failed history paper;

and of opening the truths – or legends, grandma, that are

locked indelibly within the black roots of

your dyed auburn hair.

 

we have a secret, grandma,

and I’ll tell you one of mine too, because

since that day you told me yours

I never drew that picture.

 

because that picture, grandma,

your picture,

became mine.

 

Grandma, we have a secret.

 

I’ll keep mum. 

I hope you enjoyed that! 

And as mentioned earlier, the next two poems are little harmless rhymes from the creative writing camp. i'm afraid the second one's not very scientific, but still, enjoy.

Eight O'clock

A rusty shimmer broke the cold

Of a hard metallic dawn,

And noisy traffic split the ears

Of a heavy city morn.

 

Sunlight streamed past opaque roofs

And fell on textured roads,

Glanced off the numbered pavement-ends

And accessorized abodes.

 

Those rays of sharp and cutting light

Spliced across the bay,

Woke the children, smashed the dreams

Of a summer holiday. 

The Baby factory

Warm and fragile the baby pops

Suggestive of a mint –

Breathtaking, well-crafted they all are

(that fashionable, healthy tint)

 

Yet can they be more precious now,

“uniquely special clones?”

When they have tinkling, silent labs

As their Christmas-dinner homes?

 

Of course they’ll be adopted soon,

All in good time, they say.

But the quiet, empty orphanage is

Their shelter for today.

 

Looking back at those round test-tubes

I guess they sometimes think,

I’d rather have seen the light of a womb

Than this dead and glassy thing.