By Tabitha Lee

In early September, I attended Michelle Tan’s book launch at BooksActually. She launched her first published poetry collection: The Confusion of Happiness .

Standing by the narrow aisles of the bookstore, we were treated to an evening’s delight of poetry readings from her collection, interspersed with snippets of her life experiences and thoughts. Michelle is a young artist – perhaps the same age as most of us. She has just graduated from King’s College London, and is on her way to further studies. What is interesting about her is that she is a Music student, training as a mezzo-soprano. And I believe that this is what makes her a very unique poet. She has gone through life with great exposure to both Literature and Music, and the influences of both are extremely evident in her poetry.

One merely has to look at the titles of her poems to see the impact of Music and Literature on her writing: “The Soprano,” “Sinfonia Concertante,” “an aside,” “after lancelot – & arthur’s loss” to name a few. These titles hold explicit references to Music and Literature. Moreover, many musical imagery and literary allusions lay interwoven within the poems themselves. She quotes many literary giants such as Gertrude Stein, Marge Piercy, and Larkin. Many of her poems also contain self-reflexive musings on words, the act of writing, and poetry. Music is definitely a key feature in her works, where many musicians’ names and instruments are referred to. At times, Music is used as a motif or as a metaphor to hint at a deeper meaning not explicitly laid out.

Most of the poems in this collection are confessional, dealing with very private experiences. What immediately struck me when Michelle began reading her first poem, was how raw it all is. There is so much truth-telling in them, so much honesty, so much organicity that it actually shocked me a little. The experience was akin to overhearing her private thoughts, in which I felt partly like a confidante, partly like an intruder. For example, in “Schopenhauer”, she writes about paradoxical desires and the act of writing as a relief:

I wake on the thought of someone

I want but don’t know, I don’t want

because I know, and – each letter is a space,

a palace to hide in… (4-7)

 

In “Missing”, she writes about issues of identity as a Singaporean away from her homeland, studying abroad:

… Here everyone tried

 

to place my accent but even I

don’t know what my teeth

and tongue feel any longer

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

I am Singaporean not just

Chinese…” (6-9, 23-24)

 

And in “Plus Six Five”, she writes about the experience of maintaining relationships across space and time:

… My dearest still,

I don’t remember when you became text

in a cold phone, or when I flew out

of your fingers in the same form. (15-18)

 

I could not help but wonder at the vulnerability with which she writes her poetry. No artifice, no pretence, just raw emotion being expressed through language and music. In some sense, to be a poet demands much courage and a willingness to be seen through, for poetry is a very personal art form, and Michelle’s poetry embodies so much of her in it.

My biggest takeaway from this book launch is the thought that poetry is a kind of composite art. When asked if her time spent overseas has been an influence on her writings, Michelle explained that the livelier arts scene had given her more opportunities to experience live concerts and to appreciate art work. She illustrated that poetry is the meeting of Literature, Music, and Art. Poetry is Literature – in terms of its words, meanings, language used. Poetry is Music – the way the poem sounds is important with elements like meter, rhythm and rhyme. Poetry is Art – the way the poem is arranged visually on the page. Poetry is each and all at the same time. Have you ever felt that the rhythm of your thoughts and feelings was disrupted when reading poetry to the playing of random background music? Have you ever felt that something was missing when you merely had an auditory but not visual experience of poetry? Indeed, poetry is such a unique art form because it is many amalgamated into one, engaging multiple senses simultaneously.

“Character Pieces” is a poem which aptly encapsulates this idea. It is made up of three distinct parts, very much like three movements in a piece of music. The first part seems to embody the idea of Art, being about a painter called Cherubino. This portion has an interesting structure of gaps between words:

One day he woke up and discovered girls,

girls, girls! Wondrous women of curvature

sizes miniature                          of the best signature (1-3)

This creates an unusual visual effect as we read the poem. Moreover, there are also musical qualities with the rhyming of “curvature”, “miniature” and “signature”. In the second portion of the poem, she titles it Sesto which is a place in Italy, and this portion seems to embody Literature: it is peppered with references to “Larkin” and “Hamlet” (10, 15). The final portion of the poem seems to embody Music; she first describes a pianist, then goes on to describe herself as a musician. Art, Literature and Music are all distinctly and skilfully captured in this poem.

A personal fan of both music and poetry, it was a fascinating evening in exploring the boundaries and confluences of both, reflecting on the nature of writing, and perusing the mind of a new writer whose experiences of art and overseas living greatly shapes her writing. Michelle Tan is a unique and compellingly honest poet – definitely an up-and-coming young local writer to look out for (and an inspiration for some of us of the present generation to start writing, perhaps?).