Heng Siok Tian (b. 1963)
SELECTED POEMS
Grandma’s Attic, Mom’s HDB
At Lunar New Year's reunions,
my kid cousins and I would be banished
into grandma's attic to play hide and seek.Once up there, there would be no coming down except
to use the toilet or be whipped.
The women adults roasted in the kitchen preparing
to feed an extended family.
Grandma would sit in the living room, fanning herself,looking on as her four sons cracked at mahjong noisily,
half-nude (privilege of son-hood), swearing in singlets
while females were stewing near stoves.We thought little of sanitation or hygiene.
Pickled food on open shelves tasted good.
A pot of braised meat was a special treat.After food, it was back to the attic or a romp in the streets.
We replayed the scene till Grandma sold her Chinatown house
to buy each of her sons their HDBs.After mother scrimped and saved for her first one-room flat,
I ran along common corridors. There were no daffodils
near a brook.
I fell into a longkang.I did not frolick among meadows; pastures; I smelled
after-rain lallang.
I did not listen to nursery rhymes; pots and pans clanged constant.
I did not read the Bible (till much older); joss sticks burned my fears.I did eat, sleep, shit (homely) enough in mom's HDB.
I did go to school,
picked up literacy, gained employability.I prayed to gods, first my grandma's, then my mother's,
drank the water with ashes burnt from triangular yellow-paper
amulets.
Then I pray to my own.
by Heng Siok Tian
from Grandma's Attic, Mom's HDB, My Wallpaper (2021)
