In the cupboard, bare hangers are skeletons
for future selves; a complimentary bathrobe
waits like a new and better, even purer, skin;
fresh pillows are the unformed bodies
of lovers yet to be born; bedroom slippers
become footwear for shuffling up
an airy flight of stairs free of this life.
Open the fridge, lean past the overpriced
chocolate and the smugly settled soft drinks
and tune in to voices from the god-realm,
where beings reminisce, not unfondly, about
past desires and mistaken attachments.
On the bed, our bodies stay unentwined
in rest because love is in a different room
in a faraway country; but beneath us,
cowering children press ears to the floor,
absorbing the footfalls of fathers retreating,
heads lowered in shame or shaking with disgust;
these trembling versions of us reach
for each other now, smaller hands taking hold.
In reality, the air-con sighs as discreetly
as possible; behind translucent curtains, night
slowly lifts; nobody expects the morning
to be spectacular; although my eyes are
reluctant to close, still hungry for the ever-new;
while another stranger beside me sleeps and sleeps.
Cyril Wong is the Singapore Literature Prize-winning author of poetry collections such as Unmarked Treasure, Tilting Our Plates to Catch the Light and After You. He has also published Let Me Tell You Something About That Night, a collection of strange tales, and a novel, The Last Lesson of Mrs de Souza. He lives in Singapore.