Spot these ‘hidden’ poems around town

SINGAPORE — If you are walking around The Arts House and the Esplanade this weekend, and it happens to be raining, you could be in for a surprise — you might spot previously unseen stanzas of poetry mysteriously becoming visible on the pavements.

Called SingPoOnTheSidewalks, the project is organised by literary non-profit Sing Lit Station, and the poetic lines are the creations of six poets — Felix Cheong, Ann Ang, David Wong and Simon Tay, Gwee Li Sui, and migrant worker-poet Md Mukul Hossine. The works were selected from a set of 25 extracts which were curated by Young Artist of the Year 2016 Pooja Nansi, who said she picked the extracts for “their impact, brevity, and to represent a wide swath of Singapore writing”.

The 25 pieces were then voted on by the public, gathering more than 2,000 votes in total, before the final six were selected.

Crowdfunded using Indiegogo, the organisers were inspired by Raining Poetry, a public art project held in Boston, the United States, where poems stenciled on the city’s pavements become visible when it rains.

Joshua Ip, one of the founders of Sing Lit Station, shared: “We hope to bring joy to people even in the rain, as rain is often a reason for unhappiness — waterproof poetry brings a reason for joy.”

“Symbolically, poetry is often also virtually invisible — you need to look closely to appreciate it amid the bustle of the everyday, and we want to encourage people to put in the additional attention to read it,” he added.

Creating these “poetry installations” involved the use of special waterproof paint, which is brushed onto large-sized stencils of the poems placed on the pavement. An interesting spot to check out would be the plaza between The Arts House and Victoria Theatre, where you will find poetry by Mukul on red tiles there.

Ip shared that Mukul’s piece “Me Migrant” is particularly poignant “because the construction going on around The Arts House is done by migrant workers”.

Mukul explained that his poetry is based on his experience of leaving his home country of Bangladesh to come here, and are related to his worries about his family back home.

Meanwhile, Gwee said his poem is intended to portray “love and its survival in a practical world”. Cheong’s poetry at the Esplanade is also about love, while Ang said her poetry is “about the secret prayers we all have, the wordless thoughts and the tongue-tied heart”.

To run for two months, the poetry initiative on the pavements around The Arts House and Esplanade is only the first wave in conjunction with the Singapore Writers Festival, which runs from Nov 4 to 13.

More poetry will be popping up on pavements, including the area around the Singapore Art Museum, and schools and community centres.

Correction: In an earlier version of this story, we incorrectly referred to Mr Gwee Li Sui as female. We are sorry for the error.