The Son is in Secondary School by Affran Sa'at
My badge has a Latin motto
Hope for the future
The future is hope
Or something
At times black crows try to interrupt
When we sing the National Anthem
It is difficult to maintain
The whiteness of my shoes
Especially on Wednesdays.
I must admit there is something quite special
About the bare thighs of hardworking scouts
The Malay chauffeurs
Who wait for my schoolmates
Sit on the car park kerb
Telling jokes to one another
Seven to the power of five is unreasonable.
On Chinese New Year
Mrs Lee dressed up
In a sarong kebaya
And sang Bengawan Solo
The Capital of Singapore is Singapore.
My best friend did a heroic thing once
Shaded all A's
For his Chinese Language
Multiple-choice paper
In out Annual Yearbook
There is a photograph of me
Pushing a wheelchair and smiling
They caught me
At the exact moment
When my eyes were actually closed.
The poem above has 31 lines, organised into stanzas. Its a free verse, with no rhyme of regular rhythm. There is personification, as the poet describes the crows as interrupting the National Anthem. The author describes his best friend's foolish act as heroic, and tried to get you to see failing his Chinese as a heroic thing. The sarong Kebaya dressed by Mrs Lee on Chinese New Year symbolises Singapore's Racial Harmony. The Malay Chauffeurs symbolise the number of children born with a silver spoon in their mouth, afterall, not everybody has chauffeurs. This poem gives readers a glimpse into the life of a secondary school child. His blunders and the cliques that are present in Secondary School ( Rich kids). Also suggesting that sometimes during at school, you have to get down and dirty. (maybe Physical Education).
MY POEM
The Good Old Days
It was just over a year ago.
When i was still in primary school.
Canteen food tasted like rubber.
It was likea mini-heaven we all lived in.
Free from the horrors of the modern world.
Our ignorance was our shield.
Throngs of students would rush out
Everyday when school ended.
It was a tsunami of bodies,
hot, sticky and restless.
The library was never quiet.
People talking like it was their living room.
It was a warzone.
Every few minutes you would see a pillow fight.
All in the name of fun.
Thus were the good old days.
When i was still in primary school
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Could it be presumptuous that his best friend failed? Maybe he passed with a top mark? Where's your poem?? Now choose 2 classmates and comment on their analysis and poem.
ReplyDeleteA good analysis and the use of colours to represent a different topic. I agree with Deckard. You might be lucky and get all questions correct, providing all the answers are 'A'.
ReplyDeleteA good analysis and the use of colours to represent a different topic. I agree with Deckard. You might be lucky and get all questions correct, provided all the answers are 'A'.
ReplyDeleteVery nice poem and nicely written, and your poem seeems do dreamy. Ah! the good old days... I totally agree that canteen food tastes like rubber
ReplyDeleteHorror, ignorance, tsunami, war zone...glad I didn't go to your school. But come on admit it, you loved it. The funny thing is as you get older, it gets even better! It's kind of like my golf game: the older I get the better I used to be when I was younger!
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