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Moving People With Words

Poems on the MRT

River ghazal by Leonard Ng

 

Bulbuls call in the cold morning, through the mists above the river.
Rain rippling over stones turns the pavement to a river.

People surge in the train stations, waves cresting and falling;
we flow around each other, at once both rock and river.

Wrapped in moonlight, how long we gaze. On the wind, cicadas.
The faces of old friends seem to shimmer in the river.

Barely a sound; only our breathing and the music of our stride.
We walk on past the fishermen casting dreams into the river.

In time, we learn that all things rise and all things cease.
The world we live in–only leaves, floating on the river.

I’ve waited long enough to find, in this place, a moment’s peace.
Time brings a quiet breeze and lanterns by the river.

Published in This Mortal World (2011)

Purchase the book here.

Leonard Ng serves as Chief Editor of Contour. He is the author of the poetry collections This Mortal World and Changes and Chances, the former shortlisted for the 2012 Singapore Literature Prize. He is also the translator of several classical Chinese works into English, including the Laozi Dao De Jing, The Art of War, The Complete Poems of Yu Xuanji, and Lu Ji’s Rhapsody on Literature. His work has also appeared in the journals Asymptote, Ceriph, Kitaab, and Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, as well as in the anthologies Love Gathers All: The Philippines-Singapore Anthology of Love Poems (2002), Coast: A Mono-titular Anthology of Singapore Writing (2010), From Walden to Woodlands: An Anthology of Nature Poems (2015), and UNION : 15 Years of Drunken Boat, 50 Years of Writing From Singapore (2015).

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Poems on the MRT is an initiative by the National Arts Council, in partnership with SMRT and Stellar Ace. Produced by Sing Lit Station, a local literary non-profit organisation, this collaboration displays excerpts of Singapore poetry throughout SMRT’s train network, integrating local literature into the daily experience of commuters. Look out for poems in English, Chinese, Malay, and Tamil in trains on the East-West, North-South and Circle Lines, as well as videos created by local artists and featuring local poets in stations and on trains. The Chinese, Malay, and Tamil poems are available in both the original languages and English. To enjoy the full poems, commuters may read them on go.gov.sg/potm.

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