Changi
(Revisited)

the heat haze is gone
dissipated
into the melancholy October sky.
But the inmates remain -
locked up in their minds,
their eyes misty
and as blank as the shuttered French windows
of the bungalows outside (they haven't been occupied
in years).

Try not to look at their skin
brown,
and as parched as the fallen angsana leaves;
forget the fermenting smell of urine
and the hovering flies
like vultures waiting to feast
on diseased meat
and bones
sticking out through sallow skin.

always believe what they say about a second childhood.
It helps you forget
and gloss over
the repeated mutterings of the inmates
lingering in the still and silent Changi air.
Silent;
because the cicadas are already dead.

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