7.1.09

Private Moon in Singapore on Biennale WONDER 2008

Private Moon, 2003. Installation by Leonid Tishkov


Singapore poet Leong Liew Geok inspired the Private Moon installation

Moon at window sill,
Smiling crescent parked outside,
Unwilling to budge

On flat roof with me
Silent witness of lit rooms:
Unknown company

Bent over with you
Piggyback-rider,
to gauge—Water below bridge!

My yoke of white jade,
Sole passenger to ferry
Wherever I row

Your Brightness on sled
I lug across waves of snow.
Why can’t You float home?

At this opening
You’ll wait, light at tunnel’s end,
Anticipating

I’ll come to take you
Home to your usual table ….
Here—eat these apples!

Stuck on snowy roof
You’re prostrate, an empty stage
I’ll shovel upright

You’re there, attic moon,
Before I end an antique
Trip to count cobwebs

Side by side we lie—
Keep your whole self covered, else
I won’t get to sleep!

Leong Liew Geok 3 October 2008

Dr Leong Liew Geok, an English professor, sent me these seven haikus based on an installation at City Hall. She’s written two volumes of poetry so far: “Love is Not Enough” and “Women without Men”. A third one, “Passions”, is on the way.
http://www.singaporebiennale.org/index.html