Professor Emeritus Edwin Thumboo
Distinguished guests,
Poets and stalwarts of language,
Students and friends of literature,
1. A very good evening. Thank you very much for inviting me to the opening of Poetry Festival Singapore 2026. I know we are supposed to open the Poetry Festival, but just with the initial few readings, it feels like I am already in the thick of things. It makes me wonder how the next three days will be, how exciting, and how much more enthralling it will be for all of us.
2. Perhaps I will share a bit on the initial reflections I've had as I was coming up here. I was introduced to Festival volunteers Gwenn and Isabelle, who are 14-year-old students in secondary school, and as I was walking in, I was introduced to someone who needs no introduction, Professor Emeritus Edwin Thumboo, who is well into his nineties. There are very few events where we have participants actively enjoying and engaging with the topic across such a range of ages – someone who is in their teens, and another in their ninetieth year of age, enjoying the same topic. That speaks to the power of poetry for all of us in our lives.
Borders and Bridges
3. This year's theme, Borders and Bridges, invites us to reflect on much that is happening around the world today. Interconnected we are more than ever. In fact, the reading earlier on told us how much we can connect across different borders and bridges. Never has it been so easy to build and maintain relationships across the world, yet the world is still a place where lines are drawn, where tensions exist and where polarity exists.
- Borders, real or imagined, arise as we seek to find our own uniqueness in the world, as we shape our identities, as we build our communities and as we attempt to find social connectedness from our shared experiences. This is where borders arise.
- Some borders protect, while other borders may divide. Some are more visible and entrenched, like on our maps. Others can appear more nebulous and dynamic, moulded perhaps gently over time, malleable and taking shape from the society of the day – a bit like the use of language, and the evolution of cultures over different generations.
4. Poetry comes alive, and is most needed, at the borders and the bridges.
- In an age where borders – political, cultural, generational, psychological – seem to harden, poetry offers us the practice of making a crossing. Poetry teaches us to feel, to recognise, to observe, and to experience the lines that separate us, and then to find the language and the words that connect us with the other side.
- Poetry also has the paradoxical ability to connect both personally and universally. The beauty and power of poetry can transcend even the highest of borders. Sometimes, a poem written in one place can resonate so deeply with someone on the other side of the world, even if the language medium may differ. A testament to that is the book you have in your hands – how one language can be translated and transcribed into a different language, and still have the same impact that the poet had intended.
5. I am reminded of a poem that I read when I was in school, around the same age as Gwenn and Isabelle. The poem is in Malay, and its title is, "Ini Nasi Yang Ku Suap" by the late Masuri SN. Some of you here in this room may have had the privilege of knowing him personally as well.
- I translate the title, "Ini Nasi Yang Ku Suap" as, "This is the rice that feeds me". It is an ode to the hard work of farmers; that their work is not merely planting rice but speaks to the translation of values, character, life ethos and aspirations one wishes to sow for the next generation.
- In the staple rice grain that one feeds on contains a gift of hard, honest, dignified work from a member of society to another. A reflection of the importance of nourishing ourselves not just for the survival of physical being but also for the soul of community and society.
6. Poetry has a way of connecting us, a bridge as it were, that affords us a crossing over borders of place, time or people; inviting us to observe what divides, what unites, to listen before we speak, to understand before we judge, and to stay curious about each other's experiences.
Poetry and Education
7. That practice of curious and careful listening is also, I believe, at the heart of a good education.
- In the fast-paced lives that we have, a poem slows us down long enough to ask better questions, to sometimes sit with confronting issues or difficult emotions that perhaps resist easy answers. This is precisely what we want to cultivate in our young people – the ability to think critically and creatively, to hold complexity without rushing to conclusions, and to engage thoughtfully with perspectives different from their own.
8. Language is not merely a functional communication tool. It can heal, comfort and connect. Especially when used and expressed with proper depth, nuance and the weight of the words.
- I was sharing earlier with Gwenn and Isabelle, as well as the Festival Director Dr Eric Tinsay Valles, that in my previous life, I was a clinical psychiatrist in the private practice. We talked about how soothing it can be when you're in a position of difficult emotions, and you're able to find the words to ground it, to be able to describe it, to be able to ascribe an identity to it. It can be very cathartic – the same word that both Mr Eric and I thought of in the lift earlier – and poetry can do that for each and every one of us.
- When a student learns to read a poem carefully – to notice what is said as well as what is left unsaid, to be attentive why a word was chosen and not another – they are developing a trait that will serve them well beyond the classroom.
- And when they write – and certainly writing poetry takes courage – our students too are learning to give shape to their inner thoughts and experiences, to find words for things that might otherwise remain unspoken or undescribed. The hope is that, through words and poetry, they become more mindful and conscious of their own identity, and are able to ground themselves in the face of challenges that could lie ahead.
9. Inevitably, we will continue to be a nation that will be shaped by change, by movement, by encounters, and hopefully one with less borders and more bridges.
- For a long time to come, Singapore will be a place of confluence of cultures, traditions and languages, and certainly also a constant churn between inherited customs and contemporary realities. A contact point for new ideas, different innovations and the multiplicity of aspirations for the future.
- Crossings are not always easy, it can be difficult trying to go to another side. But they can be sources of creativity, inspiration and strength. In that regard, our literature reflects that and poetry remains very much an essential part of it.
Conclusion
10. A festival of this nature would not be possible without a great deal of effort and dedication. Thank you to the organisers for creating a space where dialogue, creativity and community can flourish.
11. To the teachers who encourage our young people to read, and Dr Tan Chee Lay is one of them, to write and to find their voices: thank you for opening those doors. And to all the poets participating this year, thank you for the generosity of your time in making this festival possible.
12. I hope this festival inspires all of us to listen more deeply, to connect more meaningfully, and to keep building bridges through the power of words.
13. Poetry helps us appreciate better who we are. But I think it also helps us discover who we might become, together.
14. With that, ladies and gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure and privilege to declare Poetry Festival Singapore 2026 officially open.
15. Thank you.