Funeral Day

Eileen Chong

If there are six million people in Singapore, how many die each year? I could google that. My grandmother’s ashes were scattered in the sea. My best friend’s father’s ashes will be in the same waters tomorrow. How many bones are on the bottom of the ocean? A runway was made of crushed coral; walls were built from lime and mortar. Stage lights flicker as actors mouth their lines. In Japan, train stations don’t have physical barriers. In a dystopian movie where everyone has disappeared from the city, the characters still stop to pay for their rides. I sew tiny outfits for my dolls, but it is hard to follow the plot when you do not read the subtitles. Lately, I have been dreaming in Chinese: boat, roof, horse, sun. Somewhere, a man is counting the number of times I have written the word ‘moon’ in my poems. Turn out the light and shut the door. Blow out the flame, or everything will burn.