"THE LITANIES OF OUR HOPE AND DESPAIR"

     A million thanks, Estela Bisquera Guerrero, for reading and liking some of the lines of the protest poetry, "The Litanies of Our Hope and Despair". 

     The poem was one of the five that I submitted to Prof. Junley Lorenzana Lazaga of the University of the Philippines Baguio for his Ilokano Project-- an anthology of Ilokano poems written from 2000 to 20015. I submitted at least 5 poems, three of which are parallel texts (Ilokano with English translations.)

Here are the lines that interested Estela, a mannurat who writes for Bannawag, the Ilokano weekly magazine printed in the Philippines. This appeared on my timeline in my FB account:

  "Ania ngamin ti kinapudno?/ What then is truth?
 Ti kinapudno iti imatang dagiti politiko?/Truth in the eyes of politicians?
 Ti kinapudno iti amiris dagiti tattao?/Truth as analyzed by the people?
 Wenno ti pudno a kinapudno?/Or the truth that is truly true?
 Salakniban kadi iti bassawang-retorika ti politika/Shall we defend it from the pompous political rhetoric
 A manglenglengnges iti ina a daga?/That is choking the motherland?"