hailherseol

[hailherseol]

“Last Night in Nanjing” by Virgilio A. Almario

All day it was raining

 On the way back from Tian Gong

 I gazed back

 At the fading moon

 Behind a branch lu-tong.

  Reminiscing on memories as they fade.

[hailherseol]

“Dream of Knives” by Alfred A. Yuson

Last night I dreamt of a knife

I had bought for my son. Of rare design,

it went cheaply for its worth–short dagger

with fancily rounded pommel, and a wooden sheath

which miraculously revealed other, miniature blades.

 Oh how pleased he would be upon my return

from this journey, I thought. What rapture

will surely adorn his ten-year princeling’s face

when he draws the gift the first time. What quivering

will most certainly be unleashed.

 When I woke, there was no return, no journey,

no gift, and no son beside me. Where do I search

for this knife then, and when do I begin to draw

happiness from reality, and why do I bleed so

from such sharp points of dreams?

Our dreams linger, while reality stings.

[hailherseol]

“Holy Sonnet 10” by John Donne

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou are not so;

For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow

Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go,

Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.

Thou'art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,

And poppy'or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

Being dead must be more pleasurable.

[hailherseol]

“Problem Is” by Conchitina R. Cruz

They say poor Filipinos multiply

like rabbits since they have nothing

to do but fuck. Living in houses with room

 only for the inevitable brush

of the hand against the buttock in between

chores, on the way to switch

 channels to the daily noontime show,

no money and little space

lead to nowhere

 but to coupling. We used to joke

and call our selves typical Filipinos,

broke and empty-handed,

 when all we did was touch, and for all

the movies we missed, fancy dinners

we didn’t have, books we borrowed

 but never owned,

we compensated

by making love.

 You told me not to worry,

that someday the worst

would end, just a couple of right

 moves and it would be over.

Should I have told you then

we’d never been better,

 should I have told you then

to hold your tongue, but we had

no room for such words.

 We were rabbits,

Seeking the other side, bent on

Crossing the pasture.

 Condescending power over making love rabbits.

[hailherseol]

“Jolography” by Paolo Manalo

O, how dead you child are, whose spoiled

Sportedness is being fashion showed

 Beautifuling as we speak -- in Cubao

There is that same look: Your Crossing Ibabaw,

 Your Nepa Cute, Wednesdays

Baclaran, "Please pass. Kindly ride on."

 Tonight will be us tomorrowed-

Lovers of the Happy Meal and its H,

 Who dream of the importedness of sex as long as it's

Pirated and under a hundred, who can smell

 A Pasig Raver in a dance club. O, the toilet

Won't flush, but we are moved, doing the gerby

 In a plastic bag; we want to feel the grooves

Of the records, we want to hear some scratch-

 In a breakaway movement, we're the shake

To the motive of pockets, to the max.

 The change is all in the first jeep

Of the morning's route. Rerouting

 This city and its heart attacks; one minute faster

Than four o'clock, and the next

 Wave that stands out in the outdoor crowd

hanging with a bunch of yo-yos-

 A face with an inverted cap on, wearing all

Smiles the smell of foot stuck between the teeth.’

Language evolves with ambiguous flow shades.

[hailherseol]

“Order for Masks” by Virginia R. Moreno

To this harlequinade

 I wear black tight and fool’s cap

 Billiken*, make me three bright masks

 For the three tasks in my life.

 Three faces to wear

 One after the other

 For the three men in my life.

  When my Brother comes

 make me one opposite

 If he is a devil, a saint

 With a staff to his fork

 And for his horns, a crown.

 I hope for my contrast

 To make nil

 Our old resemblance to each other

 and my twin will walk me out

 Without a frown

 Pretending I am another.

  When my Father comes

 Make me one so like

 His child once eating his white bread in trance

 Philomela* before she was raped. I hope by likeness

 To make him believe this is the same kind

 The chaste face he made,

 And my blind Lear* will walk me out

 Without a word

 Fearing to peer behind.

  If my lover comes,

 Yes, when Seducer comes

 Make for me the face

 That will in color race

 The carnival stars

 And change in shape

 Under his grasping hands.

 Make it bloody

 When he needs it white

 Make it wicked in the dark

 Let him find no old mark

 Make it stone to his suave touch

 This magician will walk me out

 Newly loved.

 Not knowing why my tantalizing face

 Is strangely like the mangled parts of a face

 He once wiped out.

  Make me three masks.

 Three masks, altering mind per situation.

[hailherseol]

“Lament for the Littlest Fellow” by Edith L. Tiempo

The littlest fellow was a marmoset.

He held the bars and blinked his old man’s eyes.

You said he knew us, and took my arms and set

My fingers around the bars, with coaxing mimicries

Of squeak and twitter. “Now he thinks you are

Another marmoset in a cage.” A proud denial

Set you to laughing, shutting back a question far

Into my mind, something enormous and final.

 The question was unasked but there is an answer.

Sometimes in your sleeping face upon the pillow,

I would catch our own little truant unaware;

He had fled from our pain and the dark room of our rage,

But I would snatch him back from yesterday and tomorrow.

 You wake, and I bruise my hands on the living cage.

 Imprisoned for being good for nothing.

[hailherseol]

“The Spouse” by Luis G. Dato

Rose in her hand, and moist eyes young with weeping,

She stands upon the threshold of her house,

Fragrant with scent that wakens love from sleeping,

She looks far down to where her husband plows.

 Her hair dishevelled in the night of passion,

Her warm limbs humid with the sacred strife,

What may she know but man and woman fashion,

Out of the day of wrath and sorrow, life?

 She holds no joy beyond the day’s tomorrow,

She finds no worlds beyond his arm’s embrace,

She looks upon the Form behind the furrow,

Who is her Mind, her Motion, Time and Space.

 Oh, somber mystery of eyes unspeaking,

And dark enigma of Life’s loves forlorn,

The sphinx beside the river smiles with seeking,

the secret answer since the world was born.

 Her love for him destroys her.

[hailherseol]

“Day on the Farm” by Luis G. Dato

I’ve found you fruits of sweetest taste and found you

Bunches of duhat growing by the hill,

I’ve bound your arms and hair with vine and bound you

With rare wildflowers but you are crying still.

 I’ve brought you all the forest ferns and brought you

Wrapped in green leaves cicadas singing sweet,

I’ve caught you in my arms an hour and taught you

Love’s secret where the mountain spirits meet.

 Your smiles have died and there is no replying

To all endearment and my gifts are vain;

Come with me, love, you are too old for crying,

The church bells ring and I hear drops of rain.

 Love necessarily requires flaws and imperfections.

[hailherseol]

“Deception” by Antonino Soria de Veyra

ten floors up

a lizard

punctual

at six o'clock

crawls down

stopping

every now

and then

along the

slender

tree trunk

and kisses

the ground

nitrified

loam of the

arboretum

ten floors

up

 High pride dresses up as humility.

[hailherseol]

The Sick Rose” by William Blake

O Rose thou art sick.

The invisible worm,

That flies in the night

In the howling storm:

 Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy:

And his dark secret love

Does thy life destroy.

 The hell of dark secret love.

[hailherseol]

“Moonlight on Manila Bay” by Fernando M. Maramag

A light, serene, ethereal glory rests

Its beams effulgent on each crestling wave;

The silver touches of the moonlight wave

The deep bare bosom that the breeze molests;

While lingering whispers deepen as the wavy crests

Roll with weird rhythm, now gay, now gently grave;

And floods of lambent light appear the sea to pave-

All cast a spell that heeds not time‘s behests.

 Not always such the scene; the din of fight

Has swelled the murmur of the peaceful air;

Here East and West have oft displayed their might;

Dark battle clouds have dimmed this scene so fair;

Here bold Olympia, one historic night,

Presaging freedom, claimed a people‘s care.

 Healing hopes lives on and well.

[hailherseol]

“Be Beautiful, Noble Like the Antique Ant” by Jose Garcia Villa

Be beautiful, noble, like the antique ant,

Who bore the storms as he bore the sun,

Wearing neither gown nor helmet,

though he was archbishop and soldier:

Wore only his own flesh.

 Salute characters with gracious dignity:

Though what these are is left to

Your own terms. Exact: the universe is

Not so small but these will be found

Somewhere. Exact: they will be found

 Speak with great moderation: but think

With great fierceness, burning passion:

Though what the ant thought

No annals reveal, nor his descendants

Break the seal.

 Trace the tracelessness of the ant,

Every ant has reached this perfection.

As he comes, so he goes,

Flowing as water flows,

Essential but secret like a rose.

 Live a noble and passionate life.

[hailherseol]

“Lyric 17” by Jose Garcia Villa

First, a poem must be magical,

Then musical as a sea-gull.

It must be a brightness moving

And hold secret a bird’s flowering.

It must be slender as a bell,

And it must hold fire as well.

It must have the wisdom of bows

And it must kneel like a rose.

It must be able to hear

The luminance of dove and deer.

It must be able to hide

What it seeks, like a bride.

And over all I would like to hover

God, smiling from the poem’s cover

Luminance and spirituality exists in everyone.

[hailherseol]

revealing of the feeling is the beginning of healing

[hailherseol]

every night thoughts are coming 

just thinking about nothing 

but is something disturbing

closing your eyes to sleep 

crying for help to escape 

working on every step 

but nothing here is helped. 

[hailherseol]

you have literally achievements in your life

but all you can say to yourself is 

“that’s it?”