Best Malacca Poems

III

This is the land of the convectional rains
Which vie on the monsoon back scrubbing streets
This is the land at half-past four
The rainbow rubs the chilli face of the afternoon
And an evening-morning pervades the dripping, weeping
Rain tree, and gushing, tumbling, sewerless rain drains
   Sub-cutaneously...

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GETTING  TOO  OLD



Her story told by old charts, scattered, water-drenched. 
Portholes all broken, shaft and screw missing :  a  wreck ,
Grounded  on concrete platform  like an old man sitting on bench, 
Battered  funnel,  broken hawsers, holes in...

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WRECKS


Battered  funnel,  broken hawsers, holes in deck,
Grounded  on concrete platform  like an old man sitting on bench, 
Portholes all broken, shaft and screw missing :  a  wreck ,
Her story told by old charts, scattered, water-drenched. 


Battered hat, torn trousers,...

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Because some troubles and faults left by last administration, the incumbent can try to restore or redress. But for some other questionable moves beyond recantation, the incumbent can only conduct limited control on their irreversible tracks or bring petty patches to their honeycombed surfaces so...

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In 1947 in the Straits of Malacca near Indonesia
An old Dutch freighter the  SS Ourang Medan 
Sent a message out that the whole crew was dead
With the last message from the operator being, “I die” 
An all-out effort was made to find the ship
And...

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An empty packet of Gauloises,
black coffee, a croque monsieur.
An aromatic café
breakfast in the Montmartre.

Later I switch to Camels,
a bumpy ride to seek out a friend
in the sixth arrondissement,
that night I left my Dunhill lighter
on her bedstand.

The cigarette lighter
had value,
I had haggled for it in Malacca,
eventually...

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