Who are you again?
We are Sing Lit Station, a literary non-profit and workshop centre in Singapore. Our key programmes and initiatives include Singapore Poetry Writing Month (SingPoWriMo), the publishing imprint Ten Year Series, and the Singaporean poetry resource poetry.sg. Our aim is to also be a one-stop online resource for all things #SGLit by the end of the year, with a fully-itemised Literary Calendar and brand-new zine.
What's this about rain and poetry and pavements?
We want to bring #SGLit to as many people as possible, in ways that get people excited about poetry – its past and its potential to grow. Singapore Poetry on the Sidewalks (SPOTS) brings poetry into public spaces in new, surprising, and – we hope – impossible-to-ignore ways. With SingPoWriMo 2014-16, we found a vibrant community of people who were ready to riff on anything and produce poems, and sticking with the madness thirty days in a row. With SPOTS, we hope to bring poetry into the everyday in a more literal way. Invisible under an unsuspecting public's feet, poems will dramatically reveal themselves when it rains.
In the spirit of public consultation, we conducted a poll to select the excerpts that will appear on our sidewalks. Pooja Nansi carefully curated a list of 18 excerpts to be considered for this special project, and the public voted on their favourite poems. We in turn will be selecting the top 10 excerpts to be stencilled, sprayed, and proudly displayed on sidewalks found in the heart of town. (And only after seeking the poets' permissions to use their work, of course!)
How does the money work?
Thanks to the generosity of our calligrapher/stencil-maker and the indulgence of our poets (all costs are in SGD):
- Estimated cost of producing vinyl stencils: $80/stencil x 6-8 = $640. Each poetry excerpt requires a separate custom stencil.
- Estimated cost of magical rain-activated pavement spray: $160/bottle. Each bottle covers 80-100 sq feet of pavement, double-sprayed for lasting power. We'll need about three bottles, so 160x3 = $480.
- Calligrapher's commission: $800 (8 stencils).
- Poets' honorarium: $100 per poet. For the first stage of this project we'll be making stencils for five or six excerpts, so that's $500 / $600.
- Indiegogo, PayPal, and bank transaction costs account for 7-10% of the total funding goal.
What do I get in exchange for helping make this really cool thing happen?
$10 - Drizzle: Our eternal gratitude, and the knowledge that you have helped a bit of #SGLit claim a small but permanent place on the sidewalks, where it lies in wait for the next rainy day.
$35 - Passing Shower: Our eternal gratitude, and your name on our website. Everyone with internet access will be able to note the invaluable contribution you have made to giving #SGLit a place on Singapore's pavements. You may also feel slightly happier whenever it rains.
$50 - Cloudburst: Everything in the Passing Shower tier, plus the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to personally put chosen poems on the sidewalk. Your handiwork will exist on the walkways for years to come, bringing passers-by joy as their shoes are soaked in a tropical rainstorm.
$250 - Thunderstorm: Everything in the Cloudburst tier, plus a super amazing bonus: you get to choose one poem to be stencilled to the pavement, invisible until a sudden downpour reveals your excellent taste in #SGLit.
