Sor Fern called me up on Tuesday, to tell me that Arthur Yap had passed away. Apparently when Heng Siok Tian and Ho Poh Fun had visited him, he had enquired about the younger poets, like Hsien Min and myself.
I told Jack: 'I feel terrible'.
And Jack said: 'Don't Alfie.'
And I said: 'But what if he had a message for me?'
Jack said: 'He'd always have something to tell you won't he?'
And I scan Arthur's words now, and some of his poems I read like prayers.
- Alfian Sa'at
reading this i invariably wonder that with so many of the younger generation slipping through the cracks, stopping to write because they can no longer find the motivation to, what our elders would think of us, not in a form of deluded grandoise, but more in the vein of what would happen if we continued to write. i suppose the writing circle in singapore, partly due to size, partly due to the energy shown by the older generation to help younger, aspiring writers is a tightly knitted one, because every voice is a representation of a facet of the singapore in which we live in, and everyone of us who is capable of telling our story should actually step up and do it, because we owe it to people who believe in us, and we owe it to ourselves to maintain a soul which actually sings. there has been too much jadedness going on, too much apathy and ennui but we should never let it consume us because we are living people with voices, we are people who should continue to speak while we are still able to.
i think i need to sit at a desk again, with nothing but a pen and a blank piece of paper, piecing lyrics words together and not revulsing anyone in the process.