LONTAR issue #2

by Jason Erik Lundberg (editor)

  Over the years, you become much better at being organised so that you can quickly find your way back into being in a condition to impart. You teach yourself to keep spreadsheets of all the knowledge you need in each area, along with lists of books and articles. You also keep a separate notebook for important intellectual insights that your future selves will find useful. And taking your cue from these practices, you, Grace, began keeping this book as well.

  The events that prompted this decision occurred only last week, when, after several months of deliberation, you brought up your concerns about your increasing memory loss with the Tower Health Authority. She asked if you could be more specific about the memories that had gone "missing." You found it difficult to articulate your concerns. How do you tell someone what is missing when you can't even remember what it is? How do you recall what you have forgotten? All you could say was that your recollection of life before coming to the Tower was becoming increasingly worse. You searched for an appropriate metaphor: like an extraordinarily detailed painting partially rubbed out in places, marred here and there with patches of blankness.

  She took her off her spectacles and smiled before gently reminding you of your age. Fifty this year. It was natural to forget events that happened so long ago. You protested. Fifty wasn't that old. And there were still some things you remembered so vividly, so clearly, and the things you didn't...they weren't simply blurry or vague, they were just gone. Or it seemed as if they were gone. You weren't sure what had ever been there in the first place.

  You leaned closer and lowered your voice, knowing even as you did so, that these very actions, which you intended to indicate discretion and soundness of mind, would only confirm the madness of what you were about to utter: that after some serious thought, you were quite sure, almost positive, that these were related to the impartations. Her response was faultlessly sensible: there are no side effects to impartation. It's perfectly safe. You admitted it was silly, but you asked if she could look into it. Perhaps the person operating the machine had made an error in one of your past impartations. Perhaps there was something faulty with one of the machines. Perhaps you'd developed a medical condition that was reacting badly to the procedure.

  Have any of the other Scholars had similar issues? she asked. You blushed, saying you'd been too embarrassed to bring it up with any of your colleagues. They'd think you were crazy. She patted you on the hand, reassured you that there was no need to discuss the matter with anyone else. She would see that the Authorities looked into it and she would contact you within the next week. You thanked her, but even as you did, the faintest of chills scurried up your spine and made you fearful.

  Fear. You couldn't remember the last time you had felt it. At the very least, not since you moved into the Tower. You returned to your rooms and tried to settle your nerves. You felt restless. Disturbed. And as you entered the kitchen to prepare the rice for dinner, your eyes came to rest on a rectangular magnet on the fridge that you'd acquired at some point or another. You didn't remember where or why. Frivolous knick-knacks were never your style. In fact, it was the only magnet on the fridge at all. In powder-blue cursive script on a yellow background, it cheerily suggested, "How about a cup of chamomile tea?" Although you didn't usually take advice from refrigerator magnets, and you hardly ever drank chamomile, you thought it wasn't a bad idea.

  You were about to put on your shoes and head down to the Tower store to buy some, when you thought you'd check if you had any already. Sure enough, there was a tin of it behind the Earl Grey and Oolong. And that was when you found it, sitting amidst the dried petals: the crumpled ball that would change your life, as it probably had countless times already.

  You shook the petals off and smoothed it out. It was from Koh Meng and Ismail, informing you that they were doing well and hoped you were well too. Now that the children had grown up and they had some more spare time on their hands, they had decided to pick up their old hobby of gathering information and anecdotes about the Scholar programme in order to write a book. Some digging in the digital archives had unearthed an interesting report and they thought it intriguing enough to print out a short excerpt and send it to you.

  You skimmed over the dense block of tiny text they had taped to middle of the page, scrapbook style. It spoke of unforeseen significant lapses in subjects' memories growing more pronounced over time. The study recommended that, as subjects' abilities to continue preparing for impartation remained unaffected, and as these symptoms took such a long time to manifest themselves at all, impartations should be allowed to continue pending further investigation.

  "Peculiar, no?" they had written. "We thought so too, and hope to get more clarity on the matter at an interview we've arranged with the Tower Dean tomorrow morning. We'll keep you updated and we promise to write more. Affectionately yours, KM and Is."

  You crumpled the letter up again and returned it to the tin. Your hands shook as they put the tin back in the cupboard, as you thought about how many times you had probably read it, how many meetings you'd had with the Health Authority, how many reassuring pats she had given you on the hand, how many understanding smiles. You wondered how many more times it would all happen again. Lifting your head and running your eyes over the ceiling corners and lights, you looked for hidden cameras. Were they watching you now? You opened the desk drawer, found a new notebook, and began to write.

  Grace, if you are feeling as panicked as I am, please, for the sake of our future selves, remain calm. Anxiety addles the brain, and at this moment, you must be in a state to remember as much as you are possibly able, as much as they have left us. What you will find in the following pages is anything and everything I can remember at the present. More memories from the far and recent past, both trivial and important. Events, people, places, things. Images, sounds, smells. Song lyrics and snatches of poetry. Favourite foods. Least favourite books. The taste of hot broth on a rainy day. The colour of the sky just before the sun breaks over the horizon: peach-lilac.

  I will write it all down. After you read it, Grace, I urge you to pick up your pen and to do the same. They did not take the letter. If you are reading this, they have not taken this book. You'd like to think you've outwitted them, but more likely, confiscation is an unnecessary bother. You will read this account to the last word and you will feel more alive than you ever remember feeling. When you are done, you will write as frantically as I am doing now, to bring us to life again in the future. Exhaustion and resignation will eventually make you close this book. Hope will compel you to return it to its hiding place.

  Perhaps you will brush your teeth, change into your pyjamas, and go to bed. Perhaps you will simply flop down on your sofa. Either way, you suspect you know how you will wake up. To a firm gloved hand stifling your cry. This time, they're not so patient. Even before your eyelids fully descend, you see the machines being wheeled in. And you will drift into sleep once more.

  Doppelgänger

  Jerrold Yam

  Jerrold Yam (Singapore/UK) is a law undergraduate at University College London, and the author of poetry collections Scattered Vertebrae (2013) and Chasing Curtained Suns (2012). His poems have been published in more than eighty journals and anthologies across twenty countries. He has received poetry prizes from the British Council, National University of Singapore and Poetry Book Society, and is the youngest Singaporean to be nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He has been featured at literary festivals across Singapore and the United Kingdom, and his poems have been translated to Spanish. Find him at jerroldyam.com.

  On nights when

  the moon uncracks

  half her plated silicon,

  the other like a disc raised

  against the thick sludge of the

  reeling universe as if to collect it,

  culls existence from it, becoming one

  with vastness, then an oath would echo—

  homo homo!—playful as a child taunting another,

  its assonance crisp like the s
ound of irreverent joss sticks

  set on fire. Maybe he hears its melody of hurt—homo homo!—

  but does not dare answer; the word itself could be truth, how the

  way he looks at boys swiftly assembles truth on its own.

  His friends would sneer at such behaviour, something

  unnatural, something to fear and courageously

  resent. On such nights he could see himself

  adrift in a window, strewn like sand over

  the moon's terrain, the unnatural weight

  of the universe raging on his back,

  his face another of nature's

  mysteries, another myth

  he cannot concede to

  call his own.

  A Script

  Tse Hao Guang

  Tse Hao Guang (Singapore) is interested in form and formation, creativity and quotation, lyrics and line breaks. His poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Ceriph, QLRS, Softblow, Prairie Schooner, and Third Coast, as well as in anthologies and visual art exhibitions. His chapbook is hyperlinkage (Math Paper Press, 2013). He is currently studying at the University of Chicago.

  Hanacaraka

  "There were two messengers,"

  two tongues, two paths

  or ways of being. Dora:

  "I am fluid, ocean, second-

  wave feminism, I transport like

  a metaphor, I bring our master

  his Pusaka, McGuffin, Snake-oil,

  Whatever, translated so

  everyone understands."

  Sembodo: "There are

  rules. I keep them. These are

  our orders. Try moving me;

  I know where I stand. This

  Treasure, Loveliness, Truth,

  Beauty, is not for all eyes and

  ears. Think of inheritance."

  Data Sawala

  They "had animosity,"

  naturally, any storyteller

  could tell you that. Dora:

  "Rising-action-climax-falling-action?

  Phallic nonsense. You have

  another thing coming if 'Truth

  is Beauty, Beauty Truth' does

  not make you weep with

  shame. I will not fight against

  you because I am 'drunk on

  the variousness of things'.

  I have tasted the lips

  of shamans and the wildness

  of weed. I fly like Ariel over

  the dome of this purple-green

  sky. I come bearing Gifts."

  Padha Jayana

  "Equally powerful" apart,

  they weakened in loving

  embrace. Sembodo: "This is like

  Zen but not Zen. Who you

  are makes who I am―more

  Hegel if you can stomach the

  name of a dead old man.

  I trust the playwright and thus

  I see the future 'through a glass,

  darkly'―we are sacrifices, like

  it or not. You misrepresent

  the speech of others, and I quake

  before I quote word for word.

  Come, my arms are wide open!

  The Treasure is safe. This is and

  has always been so."

  Maga Bathanga

  "Here are the corpses,"

  Death and Life-in-Death.

  What is left for us but Truth?

  Holy, holy, holy Truth.

  Bookshelf Truth, musty-with-

  the-years Truth. When the

  King returned to bury he

  sought to grow a garden

  over all this Truth. He thought

  to write verses that would encompass

  the world. He took a Secret and

  formed an Alphabet. For why

  should death not smell of

  the deep ripeness of fruit

  or the sting of

  fresh-cut grass?

  Waiting for the Doctor

  Ang Si Min

  Ang Si Min (Singapore) is easily identifiable as the tall one, sometimes mistaken to be male. Dabbles in linguistics, history, physics and archaeology. Terribly geeky, and frequently distracted by the conversations in her head. Dreams of traveling in a blue box. Amateur writer, long-time cross-stitcher. Intently learning human social interactions, though maybe not quite there yet. Her poem "The Immortal Pharmacist" appeared in LONTAR issue #1.

  The metal girl and meat boy meet

  in the quiet of the specialist clinic

  off North Bridge Road.

  The boy opened the conversation,

  "Why are you here, comrade?"

  "My heartbeat makes my ear tickle,"

  her voice tinkled like wind chimes.

  "Ahh... I comprehend.

  As for myself,

  you can see..."

  he gestured.

  At the reception counter,

  A squabble of mixed

  Hokkien and English swells

  then subsides with satisfaction.

  "You ate the seeds

  of an Apple by accident?"

  one of her eyebrows clicked

  a bronze question.

  "Watermelon, actually,"

  he scratched nervously around the

  sapling sprouting from his head.

  "That would be quite unpleasant,

  should the tree reach its fruit-bearing stage,"

  she leaned in, concerned.

  Street noise roars

  momentarily.

  Someone walks past

  the sliding doors.

  "I've heard that Doctor Wong

  is good at removing

  Unwanted Arboreality—"

  he cut her off,

  "as well as being extraordinarily lazy,

  and an excellent orthopædist."

  she grinned at him,

  one finger firmly

  scratching her left ear.

  "And I reckon

  the Doctor Smiths here

  will find your loose connection,"

  he offered,

  nodding at the metal door.

  "Thank you,"

  the girl's eyes lit up

  a soft blue glow of pleasure.

  The waitlist number beeps sharply,

  summoning the boy away,

  through the wooden door.

  They exchange a wave,

  two strangers

  briefly having occupied

  a bubble of intimacy.

  Naga, A Khmer Myth

  Shelly Bryant

  Shelly Bryant (USA/Singapore/China) divides her year between Shanghai and Singapore, working as a teacher, writer, researcher, and translator. She is the author of five volumes of poetry—Cyborg Chimera, Under the Ash, Voices of the Elders, Harps Upon Willows and Unnatural Selection—a pair of travel guides, and a translation of Sheng Keyi's novel Northern Girls for Penguin Books. Shelly's poetry has appeared in journals, magazines, and websites around the world, as well as in several art exhibitions, including dark 'til dawn, Things Disappear, and Studio White • Exhibition 2011. You can visit her website at shellybryant.com.

  from the mystical lands of the west

  home of holy writ, ancient sages

  and sacred waters

  the wanderer comes to a flooded plain

  the spirit of the land

  ancient dragon, clever serpent

  watchman over the bounty of the plain

  keeps vigil as his daughter shapeshifts

  taking her form for the upcoming encounter

  the guardian spirit watches her wooing

  raises up to his full height

  gazing down on the earth through the clouds

  from his celestial perch

  he watches the sun's glint play

  on the emerald face of the floodwaters

  stooping to the earth, he opens wide his mouth

  into that gaping maw the waters are drawn

  expan
ding the beast's belly

  as if formed of the rubbery sap

  that runs through the trees on the plateau below

  beneath the canopy of the jungle

  the couple makes their bridal chamber

  the cradle of an ancient race

  Funkytown

  Daryl Yam

  Daryl Yam (Singapore/UK) is an aspiring writer of prose and poetry currently reading English Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Warwick. He has been published in Esquire (Singapore), Ceriph, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal and elsewhere. You can learn more about him at about.me/yammonation.

  1.

  "Our time has come," they said.

  "Let us be young. Let us be brave."

  "Hold my hand," they said. "Then let go."

  2.

  Have you looked out the window, recently? Out into Funkytown?

  Do you see the night sky, that canvas shrouding the Earth?

  What constellations, what stars, what distant suns and earths could compel us so?

  Like tides, they pull us; like tides they drag us beyond the shore, send us into orbit.