S’pore through to the next World Cup round … in poetry

SINGAPORE — Yes, Singapore has done what England could not. At least when it comes to poetry.

Singaporean poet and novelist Desmond Kon Zhicheng-Mingde is through to the next round of the Poetry World Cup 2014, beating China’s Yuan Changming by 49 votes to face up against Cyprus’ Nora Nadjarian on July 1.

His ferocious volley of a prose poem titled gan qing yong shi :: impulsive and impetuous flew past Yuan who will be left asking a lot of questions regarding his set piece. But mainly why. As in Y: An Alphabetic Allusion. The Chinese poet’s first line of defense, a rather lacklustre “You love ‘Y’, not because it’s the first letter”, proved no match for the attacking intent of Kon’s “blitzkrieg of the senses” which began with “It was game season, and there was blood and lust in their eyes.”

We like his competitive nature but also thank our lucky stars he’s not some Portuguese named Pepe.

The event was organised by literary journal The Missing Slate and sees 32 poets from 32 countries battling it out for the, ahem, Cup that may or may not runneth over.

We’re not sure just how strong Cyprus will be. But judging from Nadjarian’s previous poem Separation, perhaps Kon can rely on some quick counterattacking. After all, the Cypriot seems in a rather defeatist mood with the first line (“The time came when they longed to return.”) and doesn’t seem to have a credible formation way into the second (“My father walked in circles in the living room”)

Judging from his first poem, on the other hand, we’re hoping Kon will be “kicking out like a wild animal”. Just not like Pepe.

And unlike the actual World Cup, South-east Asia’s in the thick of things, too, with Indonesia, Malaysia and Laos all ready to take their chances, too.

When asked about what tactics or formation he’ll use for the next round (a rigid Italian terza rima? Total Footballesque free verse? Cute Cummings-like tiki taka?), his response was one that would make Roy Hodgson proud (and the rest of us confused).

“If I were Richard Hadfield of Collabro, I’d make a trip to Brighton Theatre Group Youth to say hi – he felt it important to give back to the place where he came from — despite the Finals for Britain’s Got Talent then just round the corner. Hadfield also said he really wanted Brighton and the whole of Sussex getting behind him and the guys. I unfortunately don’t have his good looks. So, I’ll probably sit around and read some Ginsberg just to work off the anxiety.”

Aha! So it’s good ‘ol Beat poetry from Team USA eh?

But actually, when it comes to actual footy, he’s rooting for Les Bleus or, erm, Les Algerians.

“Algeria or France because it’s the most literary choice to make, given how Derrida was born in French Algeria. It’s also the kind of slippery indecisiveness that comes with deconstruction, the capstone theory of Derrida. It’d be nice to go with a safe bet like Germany, Italy or Brazil, who have all won the cup more than three times in the past. Maybe the Netherlands, because they’ve ever only been runners-up — that was in 1974, 1978, 2010 — and that must feel terrible.”

Viewers can read the poems at http://themissingslate.com/2014/06/11/poetry-world-cup-2014/ and voting commences at the not-so-ungodly time of 3.30pm on July 1 for 24 hours.

Game on.