A Compilation of Literary Works from ASEAN Countries

By Clarisse Tan Sy

In Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Final Project in Asian

Literature

Manila Central University

Submitted to Dr. Ronald Go on the 13th of March 2019

Brunei

About the Author

Adi Rumi was born in Brunei Darussalam. He has received the South East Asian Writer

Award, awarded by the King of Thailand every year to a prominent Asian writer. His poem

‘Brothers, your cries…’ was written just days after the Boxing Day tsunami killed more than

230,000 people. He wrote this poem for those suffering in the neighbouring country, Indonesia,

where the damage was the worst. The poet’s word choice perfectly straddles that fine line

between gush and restraint that all poems about tragedy must negotiate. Take “taste sadness” for

example; the phrase mimics the very sound of a wave; the verb “taste” has a brutal immediacy to

it and comes semantically tied to the idea of salt and the disturbing thought that it was the last

taste in the mouths of those who perished.

The solemnity of the occasion is marked by the three end-stopped sentences; they create

extended pauses, each one allowing silence to enter the poem, which is perhaps the most

appropriate response to such a massive loss. The poet encourages the Indonesians – using precise

juxtapositions to create a dualism that allows the survivors a distance from the wreckage of the

wave – to hope, and to overcome the devastation. Never stumbling into maudlin declarations,

Rumi creates a tough, well-crafted poem on an intensely sad subject.

 “Brothers, your cries…”

By Adi Rumi

Brothers, your cries

are ours too.

Together we taste sadness.

We know,

you are steel-strong nation

not a flower-nation that easily droops.

Even in sorrow,

you never surrender.

Insight

“Brothers, your cries…” speaks about staying strong in the midst of adversity, as well as

supporting each other. The poem is rather concise, yet has a strong impact, especially since it was

written just a few days after a massive tragedy that injured and claimed the lives of a

monumental number of people. When you picture the moment, of children crying for their

parents, parents crying for their children, screams of people who lost those they loved and cared

deeply about, families picking up the bits and pieces of whatever they can salvage from their

crumbled homes, and people asking the heavens why this had to happen, it makes it all the more

striking, that in spite of all this, they all still stand with the strength and perseverance they need

to rebuild their lives and face tomorrow.

Cambodia

About the Author

Sophal Leng Stagg was nine years old when she and her family were forced to leave their

home in Phnom Penh in April 1975, joining the millions of Cambodians who were devastated by

the Khmer Rouge. It is for this reason that she relates the details of her experiences during the

four years that she and her family lived under the oppression imposed by this brutal regime.

Today, Sophal and her husband, Bill Stagg, run the Southeast Asian Children’s Mercy Fund, a

non-profit corporation dedicated to raising awareness of the genocide as well as collecting much

needed funds for children in Cambodia. As Sophal says, "I am determined to tell our story. I

believe our story must be told by all survivors, again and again, to prevent a repeat of the

inhumanities that existed during Cambodia's darkest years."

Sophal, Bill and their family live in Florida.

 Hear Me Now

By Sophal Leng Stagg

Peaceful times have gone away

Long gone, so far, so far away

Let me live as I will you

Peaceful times as we once knew

The young, the old, so sad these days

So sad, so scared, are we

I have closed my eyes to run away

Run away to peaceful days

Mother please stay with me

Don't go, please stay close to me

I need you now to help me see

To see the days of peace for me

Help me find those peaceful times

The times we laughed when we were free

No more pain, be at peace"

Insight

This poem was written by a little girl who was separated from her family and longed for

nothing but for things to be back to the way they were – normal. What struck me was the

desperation in her words, crying for her mother to help her find peace and happiness again,

because they have long since been forgotten amidst the cruelty, hardship, misery that she was

living through each day. This spoke volumes to me personally since I was at war with my own

mind and body for a while back. There were times when I wanted to give up, but deep down I

knew there were better times ahead, and that I just had to live through the pain and force myself

to wake up each day. My days back then were really tough that, on my best days, I would ask my

own mother to stay with me and watch me as I fall asleep, while on my worst days, I would lock

myself in my room, carve my arm, watch myself bleed, and overdose on anti-depressants and

anti-psychotics hoping I would never wake up again.

`It is hard to fight battles, be it actual, external war, or internal, psychological war, when

you feel like you are fighting front and center, with no one to back you up, which I imagine is

exactly how the nine year old Sophal felt.

Indonesia

About the Author

Toeti Heraty was born in 1933. An outstanding Indonesian poet with a powerful vision,

she is also a philosopher, an art historian and a human rights activist who is well known for her

opposition to the Suharto regime and for her feminism.

She writes subtle poems, both intimate and personal, that also highlight repressive social

and emotional conventions.

Post Scriptum

By Toeti Heraty

I want to write

an erotic poem

in which raw words, unadorned,

become beautiful

where metaphors are unnecessary

and breasts, for instance,

do not become hills

nor a woman’s body a sultry landscape

nor intercourse ‘the most intimate embrace’.

It’s quite clear

this poem is written in the space

between exposure and concealment

between hypocrisy and true feeling.

Insight

This poem by Toeti Heraty speaks about the gap between words and their meaning. It is

very straightforward, in the sense that the writer wanted to write an erotica that did not feel the

need to hide behind euphemisms for the human, particularly, female body and sex itself.

I think that it is important for us to start teaching the younger generation to be shy about

using words like “breasts” or “penis” or “vagina” because that is really what they are called.

There is no need to hide behind euphemisms because all that does is make children feel like their

bodies are dirty or evil, and that talking about certain body parts is malicious in itself.

The human body is a beautiful thing as it is.

Laos

About the Author

Bryan Thao Worra (born January 1, 1973) is a Laotian American writer. He is the first

Laotian American to receive a Fellowship in Literature from the United States

government's National Endowment for the Arts. He received the Asian Pacific Leadership Award

from the State Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans for Leadership in the Arts in 2009. He

received the Science Fiction Poetry Association Elgin Award for Book of the Year in 2014. He

was selected as a Cultural Olympian representing Laos during the 2012 London Summer

Olympics. He is the first Asian American president of the international Science Fiction and

Fantasy Poetry Association, and the first Laotian American member of the professional Horror

Writers Association.

At Home

When I am in your home,

I am back to Laos after a lifetime.

I am in a place beyond words:

Where the steam of the kitchen

The smell of warm coffee

The sound of a television

The taste of a meal made with kindness

All feel like an America where our dreams come true,

Our memories return

And everything lost is found once more

Waiting with a smile, a sabaidee.

Insight

Bryan Thao Worra’s At Home talks about what it feels like to be back to where you came

from. He wrote it with such a feeling of nostalgia that evokes the same feeling for me, the reader.

Worra still calls Laos his home, even though he moved to the United States at six months old.

Personally, I get the same feeling after being away from home for a while. Going abroad

for weeks at a time, I always forget what “home” feels until I get back. Lying in my own bed,

and smelling the familiar clean linen/laundry detergent scent that always lingers all throughout

the house always makes me say to myself, “awyisss, home sweet home.”
Malaysia

About the Author

Dato' Seri Abdul Samad bin Mohamed Said, pen name A. Samad Said (born 9 April 1932) is

a Malaysian novelist and poet. In May 1976, he was named by Malaysia literature communities

and many of the country's linguists as the Pejuang Sastera [Literary Exponent] receiving, within

the following decade, the 1979 Southeast Asia Write Award and, in 1986, in appreciation of his

continuous writings and contributions to the nation's literary heritage, or Kesusasteraan Melayu,

the title Sasterawan Negara or National Laureate. In 2015, he joined the Democratic Action

Party.
 The Dead Crow

By A. Samad Said

He saw a dead crow

in a drain

near the post office.

He saw an old man

gasping for air

and a baby barely able to breathe

in a crowded morning clinic.

This land is so rich.

Why should we suffer like this?

I want clean air

for my grandchildren.

I want the damned fools

to leave the forest alone.

I want the trees to grow,

the rivers run free,

and the earth covered with grass.

Let the politicians plan how we may live with dignity,

now and always.

Insight

The Dead Crow discusses what will happen if the environment is damaged. The persona

is sad because people become ill and have breathing problems, even though their country is

rich. The people are sick because the air and the environment are polluted. If the people in that

country continue to be ignorant, selfish and do not stop polluting the environment, they may not

be able to continue living in it.

This is very similar to what our country is experiencing. If people never learn to take care

of the environment, then the time will come when we will not be able to live here anymore. We

should be more disciplined when it comes to the environment.

Personally, I want to move out of the country because it is depressing to see how dirty it

is outside. I want to be somewhere I can breathe in deeply and not smell the smoke from cars and

motorcycles and jeepneys and buses. I can only wish that the Filipino people will realize sooner

than later that it is high time we rehabilitate the metro starting with our immediate surroundings.
Myanmar

About the Author

Mae Khwe was the daughter of the Mayor of Sittaung and she was married to a Maung

Swe. When King Bodopaya (Bodawphaya) ascended the throne in 1782, Mae Khwe became a

Court Poetess.

Short Pipe

By Mae Khwe

A pipe... a puff...

short as a finger...

I give you

for smoking.

"If I do not take it

you will think me crude

If I accept it

you will think I like you.

If you want me to smoke it

put it near the bed,

my dear one."

Insight

I think that Mae Khwe’s poem Short Pipe speaks about working and keeping it

professional with the master. She gives her master a pipe to smoke, but he tells her to leave it by

his bed rather than hand it to him directly in fear of his actions being taken out of context.
 I think that this poem values professionalism and keeping one’s distance to a superior.

This is normal, especially at the time when women were seen as inferior to men, which is exactly

when this poem was written. Nowadays, however, a friendly relationship between a boss and an

employee is common.
Thailand

About the Author

Chiranan Pitpreecha was born in Thailand in 1955. She was a well known figure in the

1970s student movement in Thailand. Following the violent suppression in 1976, she, along with

thousands of Thai students, fled to the jungle and joined the Communist insurrection. Almost

immediately after she returned from the jungle in 1981, under the protection of amnesty law, her

poem, Cracked Pebble was selected "The best Poem of 1981" by P.E.N. International, Thailand.

She then resumed her education at Cornell University in the United States where she received a

B.A. and M. A. History. Chiranan is one of Thailand's best known authors, and has produced a

wide range of writings for Thai periodicals and newspapers, from poetry, history, and travel

articles to social commentaries. In 1989 The Missing Leaf, her first poetry book based on

personal experiences in the jungle, won the prestigious South East Asia Write Award. In 1992

"First Rain" was selected as "The Best Poem of the Year" by P.E.N. International, Thailand. Her

works have been translated into English, French, German, Japanese, and Malay.
 First Rain

By Chiranan Pitpreecha

The first rains in May

Stream down, red

Steel rains, violent

Bodies-piercing, blood-flowing

Like water, flooding the streets

A rank stream of blood.

How many stars fell and crashed?

How many hearts are broken and crushed?

The wound of our native soil

When will it ever heal?

What devilish power

Dare kill the people?

Fighting blood lives on,

Death rousing people

The soul enduring,

Protecting the justice of the people.

The first rains seep into the ground and disappear into the earth

Leaving meaning and memory

Enriching the earth with their moisture

Nourishing the crops of democracy.

Insight

Initially, I was unsure of what to make of this poem because it did not come up on Google as

often or as much as I expected. It actually came up just once. And so I decided to Google “major

event Thailand in May” instead. That’s when I put two and two together and realized that First

Rain was written during the four-day protest in Bangkok against the government of General

Suchinda Krapayoon, and the military crackdown that followed. The military crackdown resulted

in 52 officially confirmed deaths, many disappearances, hundreds of injuries, and over 3,500

arrests. Many of those arrested are also alleged to have been tortured. And so I understood what

Pitpreecha meant. She was hopeful that the bloodshed won’t be for nothing.