I
We choose a neighbourhood. In 1954, 
an aerial survey is sent out
after the December floods to capture the damage.
Over what will be our home is a whole
swathe of trees, crown-shy with
sungei waters rendered light gray
with the black-and-white photography 
of the time. Bakau Pasir, Bakau Minyak,
they held the line as the rivers
surged up from the sea, Sungei Jurong
a ravenous lizard engorged
by the rains, tributaries
its tiny legs carving out
territory for itself; Sungei Pandan
a sleek silver snake 
swiftly headed inland. 

II
We choose a neighbourhood. In 1976,
electoral maps show the Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim
railway curling coyly below what
our living room window will oversee, freight
trains the predecessors of early morning
lorries that rumble in along the expressway
today from across the border. The land had only just
been reclaimed, the rivers barely tamed, 
and a mosque congregating suraus 
of displaced southern islanders
would have just been built.
Balloting for the first JTC
flats in the neighbourhood 
would only start a year later, but 
already the major roads 
are recognisable and familiar,
as are the straight lines of the reservoir
I've lapped countless times. 

III 
We choose a neighbourhood. In 2023,
residents are still moving internally
from cluster to cluster. The buildings
have gotten taller, over time
dwarfing the old mosque
at the center. We have 
no history here. The first time I saw
the silhouettes, low northern mountains
crossing borders on a clear day,
I could not stop staring. I had never
dared hope for the comfort of hills.
Train lines are being built again,
a new clutch of homes 
on the cusp of completion. 
We people the neighbourhood with
our imagined lives, ten, twenty
years into our future. Claimed and
reclaimed, for better or worse, we
make our home in this mercurial,
liminal space, aerial roots rising
between land and sea.