SHE was his "dear PY", his "guardian angel" and his "one and only on Earth".

So it was an "extremely tough" time when Mrs Sng-Fun Poh Yoke lost her husband, Mr Sng Boh Khim - poet, writer, and former principal private secretary to former presidents Devan Nair and Wee Kim Wee - two years ago to lymphoma.

Yesterday, Mrs Sng, 55, launched a compilation of her late husband's work, comprising poetry, short stories, letters and e-mail messages from him professing his love for her.

It took her two years to put together Simply This, Simply His: Portraits Of Sng Boh Khim as she found it difficult to cope with being reminded of her loss.

"Every time I took the letters out to read, I would cry and not be able to go on," she said. All 1,000 copies are available for $20 each at major bookstores.

Mrs Sng told my paper that her husband had been reluctant to put together a compilation of his work during the last few years of his life.

"He told me that he writes because he has something to say, and not to make a name for himself," she said.

He changed his mind later but died before he completed the project.

The publication of the book was therefore "something that I wanted to do for him", Mrs Sng said.

The couple met while they were in university, and got married in 1978 after dating for five years. They have four children.

"We never had any major quarrels where we exploded or called each other names. We were not the sort to get very angry," she said.

Mrs Sng hoped the book would be an inspiration to others.

"If someone can learn something from it and be moved, then the act of sharing such intimate things is worth it," she said.

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