"March of the Mushroom Corals", Jack Xi
We move with the sun, and the sun has been drifting.
These days light is further away and comes wrong—
meltwater dims every depth and the slick
of oil and ballast mars waves into mirrors.
Every night, something glares. It isn't the moon.
To walk we fill our pockets with water, then gush.
Our tentacles bloom and sink back to the ridge.
Repeat for each hour’s millimetre of creep,
up past the cave corals dangling orange from the ceilings
and the crusts of the slopes that haven't built up their bones;
young coral and sponge, weeping in the stone rain.
Sisters, we trundle over and for you.
And the swish of mothers seagrass and mangrove…
They too stride upward as the waters well.
But they flounder, for instead of mud, their roots brush rock;
instead of good silt, rebuffs of concrete.
When will the brine reach whoever built these bluffs,
whoever thought armour was the sole fate of shore?
There is no answer in the trek.
Brother barnacle whispers of nothing, or “steel”.
Sibling anemone bursts under soles.
Crow jeers of a world only wet when it rains.
We scurry, gently, towards them still,
our wide mouths stinging in the dark as we feed.
/ Jack Xi (they/he) is a queer Singaporean poet and member of the writing collective /Stop@BadEndRhymes (stylised /s@ber). They’ve appeared in several online poetry journals and Singaporean anthologies. Find out more at jackxisg.wordpress.com.
/ COMMENTARY
“Love how this is from the point of view of ‘we’, and I love the ambition behind the poem and trying to capture a whole group/army of strange marine beings on the move, as well as the invocation of other sea life as a family as well –barnacles, seagrass, etc. The reader really gets a feeling of movement and interconnectedness here, as well as a sense of curiosity for the constant moving and buzzing happening just below the sea’s surface.”
/ Q&A
What inspired you to write this poem?
Most directly, it’s things I ran into in papers and lessons – the threat sea level rise represents to corals (which need light), the ecological problems seawalls pose, corals’ senses, and of course mobile coral! That last one’s wild! I think more people should gush over those. More broadly… when I was younger, I’d thought reefs were something that existed elsewhere and not in Singapore – so I keep coming back to our reefs in my writing, academic and otherwise. There’s a lot of things that threaten our coastal ecosystems, and centering that is urgent.
How has writing for SingPoWriMo impacted you as a poet?
It’s pushed me to explore different forms of poetry I otherwise wouldn’t, both through the prompts and the people I’ve met through SPWM. It’s been a really safe place to mess around in. I’m really indebted to SPWM and hope it keeps being that kind of place for new writers!
What would you say to someone thinking about taking part in the next SingPoWriMo?
I’d say to take it easy and focus on the process and people! The numbers game on social media really does a number on us all, so it’s important to remember likes do not determine the value of our work. Neither does fulfilling every prompt. We can find value in the possibility and play of our work, and the connections we make with others.