Editor's Preface

Cover image: Mekong, The Mother of Rivers © Ore Huiying (Singapore)

It has not been easy putting together this issue. On the personal front, it has been an emotionally draining past three months since we received the diagnosis that our beloved dog has a form of bladder cancer that is inoperable. Ealga came into our lives on 14 January 2017, and since then, she has taught me what no human has been able to teach me, just by being who she is. Those of you who have (had) the privilege of bonding with an animal might be able to understand what I’m referring to. And so when we received this devastating news in October, it came as a huge blow. I was in the thick of end-year marking and found it hard to concentrate, and then it was one literary event after another. My debut poetry book Red Earth was launched and soon after, Making Kin: Ecofeminist Essays from Singapore. The book launches and various panels that I was involved in soon led to a wave of emotional fatigue. It was bittersweet for me too: How could I truly celebrate on the back of Ealga’s condition?

I found myself wanting to focus my attention inwards and at home: caring for Ealga and myself, which involved grounding practices, meditation and finding balance. Editing for The Tiger Moth Review took a backseat and I even contemplated putting this issue on hold. I found myself wondering what to write for the Editor’s Preface, and even toyed with the idea of scrapping the preface altogether (after all, how many people even read the preface?). Before sitting down to write this, I had to spend some time meditating to ground myself and find the words for this issue. 

What used to sustain and nourish me spiritually now seemed like a burden to bear. Instead, I found myself desiring solitude and reclusion. When you live with a loved one who has cancer, you begin to see things with a renewed perspective. What’s really important starts to come into focus, and everything else becomes a blurry haze.

So, it has not been easy editing this issue. But, like everything else, I am finding in me the strength and courage and power to continue the work. I am finding in me the strength and courage and power to focus on life against the backdrop of death. A while back, I was drawn to a Himalayan yak bone prayer mala. I read that the yak is a power animal that you can call on in times of scarcity, when your resources, energy and strength have dwindled and you need additional support. I have been calling on yak to support me. In being supported, I have been able to persevere with the work that is putting Issue 7 out into the world in spite of my grief. 

Issue 7 is incidentally one of our more spiritual issues. Nature and earth are revered as Spirit, Source and sustenance. We are guided by turtle over “ancient paths” with Tim Moder, we meditate over the river with Preeth Ganapathy. We bear witness, we partake in rituals. We cast too-late protection charms. We speak in ancient tongues. We “enter the water” in spite of our fear of diving with sharks, “still [our] body”, “surrender to surge” with Patricia Davis-Muffett. We observe the suffering and strength of women and the Mekong in Ore Huying’s work, we conjure and imagine and remember ghosts and familiars. We are the loons in Aaron Magloire’s poem, fucking and paying our bills. And we are the wild pig, dead after death, reborn in death; because we too are spirit, we “walk into the world/again, again, again.” 

Esther Vincent Xueming

The Tiger Moth Review