lion heart

Amanda Chong

Amanda Chong

• Singaporean• Published writer at age 11• Award-winning poet at age 16• Her story, What The Modern Woman Wants, bagged

the top spot in the Commonwealth Essay Competition in 2004.

• The following year, she took the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award, Britain's most prestigious poetry prize for those aged 11 to 17.

• Top A-Level Literature student outside of Britain• Now studying Law at Cambridge University

What’s the poem about?• Patriotic poem about Singapore• Uses the merlion to symbolize the majesty and

pride of Singapore as a nation• Written to instill pride in its citizens and

remind them to appreciate how far Singapore has come

lion heartYou came out of the sea,skin dappled scales of sunlight;Riding crests, waves of fish in your fists.Washed up, your gills snapped shut.Water whipped the first breath of your lungs,Your lips’ bud teased by morning mists.

You conquered the shore, its ivory coast.Your legs still rocked with the memory of waves.Sinews of sand ran across your back-Rising runes of your oceanic origins.Your heart thumped- an animal skin drumheralding the coming of a prince.

In the jungle, amid rasping branches,trees loosened their shadows to shroud you.The prince beheld you then, a golden sheen.Your eyes, two flickers; emerald blazeYou settled back on fluent haunches;The squall of a beast, your roar, your call.

In crackling boats, seeds arrived, wind-blown,You summoned their colours to the palmof your hand, folded them snugly into loam,watched saplings swaddled in green,as they sunk roots, spawned shade,and embraced the land that embraced them.

Centuries, by the sea’s pulmonary,a vein throbbing humming bumboats – yourtrees rise as skyscrapers.Their ankles lost in swilling water,as they heave themselves higherabove the mirrored surface.

Remember your self: your raw lion heart,Each beat a stony echo that washesthrough ribbed vaults of buildings.

Remember your keris, iron lightningripping through tentacles of waves,double-edged, curved to a point-

flung high and caught unsheathed, scatteringfive stars in the red tapestry of your sky.

Form & Structure

• 8 stanzas (first five consist of 6 lines, then stanza 6 and 7 consist of 3 lines each, with a final concluding stanza of two lines)

• No specific rhyme scheme

Tone, Mood & Figurative Language

• Tone – awe, respect, admiration• Mood – mysterious, almost mythical yet

inspiring awe?• Alliteration & powerful imagery conjured up

by vivid descriptions• Metaphors

Vocabulary

Keris - Malay or Indonesian dagger having a wavy double-edged blade.

Bumboat - a small vessel carrying provisions for sale to moored or anchored ships.

Check out more resources here….

• https://prezi.com/vey1utk1lmgy/lion-heart-by-amanda-chong/

• http://news.asiaone.com/News/Education/Story/A1Story20080424-61555.html

• https://sites.google.com/site/positivethinkingclub/thought-provoking-articles/what-the-modern-woman-wants

Essay Questions

• How does the poetess convey the spirit of the country in the form of the mythical beast, the Merlion in her poem Lion Heart?

• How does the poetess elaborate on the symbolism in her poem Lion Heart?