Saturday, July 9, 2011

BEARERS OF BLACK NAMES






scions mikey and jv looking good on
philippine TV

arrogant owners of chubby cheeks
grabbers of the biggest pie?
well-fed fellows arguing
in lifeless ire

debate never never
bloody facts are naked and bare.


inheritors of dirty millions while
a million zombies
filch wrapped throwaways
sons and daughters dying
of garbage bread.

let this cup pass
unto the mouths of plunderers
rue, rue the eternal bitterness

let soothsayers be damned
but hear ye hear ye
the cruel Jehovah Christ sayeth
doomed are bearers of black names
born of kleptomaniacs
playing Abel and Cain
walking the earth
to purgatory
where robber barons
and ill-gotten riches
burn in the sulfur
of eternal fire



singapore, july 8, 2011
Caption; PLJ with Singapore-based BBC news presenter Filipino Rico Hizon

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

NO REDEMPTION?


To gain their support, she gave sleek cars like Mitsubishi Pajeros to Roman Catholic bishops last year using Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office money for the poor?
No redemption for the Little Woman, the personification of evil (Romulo Neri's term), even if she danced with the supposed savers of souls, now unmasked as bribe takers and shameless solicitors like the Mindanao bishop who asked for an expensive car?

Mi amigo Pedro, the government under the watch of the emperadora has been described as the most corrupt in the country's history. As bad as Ferdinand Marcos, who during the martial law years, had the perceived enemies of the state either killed or "made to disappear" in lonely or mass graves?

Where is Jonas Burgos, the activist son of the Ilocano journalist Jose? Now six feet below the ground or just "disappeared" like the "desaparecidos" of Argentina. In a press conference, according to a leader of the military junta that brutally ruled that country, the desaparecidos were"neither dead nor alive; they disappeared." Actually, they--left-wing activists and political dissidents-- were kidnapped, drugged and dropped, still alive, out of aircrafts.

Or was Jonas killed by his military captors, his body put in a container that was cemented and then dropped into the sea like what some dirty Amianan politicians do to their political opponents?

KINDRED SOUL?

After falling prey to capitalist economics by selling ecclesiastical property, the High Priest of the Diocese of Laoag City was promoted (Utlegged, according to Herdy La. Yumul, one of the country's top 5 bloggers) by the Vatican to archbishop, succeeding the respected Diosdado Talamayan of the Archdiocese of Tuguegarao.

The Laoag City Diocese under the watch of Apo Sergio conducted a raffle draw the first prize of which, a Honda Civic, was won, of all people, by our kamannurat friend Fr. Danilo Laeda, (still the parish priest of San Nicolas, Ilocos Norte?) whom he earlier appointed as vicar general.

What happened, Apo Sergio?


"The function of the writer is to act in such a way that nobody can be ignorant of the world and that nobody may say that he is innocent of what it is all about."--Jean-Paul-Sartre

Monday, June 20, 2011

7/43 SERANGOON AVE 2

ON THE GLASS TABLE

It waited in silence:

Dinner of jasmine rice, mixed veggie tempura,
fried Malaysian galunggung.

Cup of Japanese green tea sat in limbo like bored Palawan rock in Sentosa.
Without bidding adieu, the Mangyan maiden
Walked away, disappeared like smoke in cyber space.

Friday, June 17, 2011

AUTHORS OF PERFIDIA















A REFRAIN, LORENZO, A REFRAIN


A. Two years later, the serpent's
head came out
of the hole of a beach: the woman
had gone to bed with a young man
named Mark.

O, how she lies:
Here lies Eli, she lies.

B. They deleted names
In list of Bucaneg Awardees,
They who lied about the money
from Hawaii,
from the US Mainland
from Ilocos poverty
For a house of memory
In Suso, by the sea,
In the town called Sta. Maria
In the north country.

And the wrinkled widow,
Lamenting for her beloved Godofredo,
Bears witness:
What a mess,
What rottenness!




"Perfidia"

sung by Linda Ronstadt

"with a sad lament my dreams/are faded
like a broken melody, while the gods
of love look down and laugh, at what
romantic fools we mortals be.."

-courtesy Mayette Cantos,
FB, June 20, 2011

Friday, June 10, 2011

THE 5TH Day in Singapore



Arrived at the Changi International Airport aboard Cebu Pacific that left Clark at 12:20PM. It was almost four in the afternoon, June 6. We started the trip from Oscariz, Ramon, Isabela Sunday morning riding on Raul's Navarra with Jovy, his third eldest boy to Manila, where we checked in at a hotel owned by an Isabela resident. Most of the helpers there were Ilocos boys. The following morning, we motored to Clark and checked in at about 9 in the morning. We had two luggage, 2 hand-carried bags and laptop slung on my shoulders. Paid the travel tax-- P1, 260.00 each. Christoffer and Christian met us at Changi's Budget Terminal.
Started yesterday reading, "The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor", the first major work of 1982 Nobel Prize winner in Literature Gabriel Garcia Marquez, published in book form in 1970. The book was borrowed by 10-year old Juan-Juan Julian from the Serangoon Public Library, located atop a mall in Serangoon, S$55 cents away from our resident via bus. Some of the books borrowed by Juan-Juan (no librarian here, it's all run by electronics): The Longest War by Peter L. Bergen, a book about the conflict between America and Al-Qaeda; Interlogue, studies on Singapore literature and a book of poetry by Robert L. Hass.
A gray day with occasional rains, we stayed mostly indoors, in the 8th floor of a 12-storey flat in Serangoon Ave. 2. It's quarter to two in the afternoon.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

KELLENG






Agrangrangawak iti sabong
nga agar-arimasa
iti linnaaw iti bigbigat.


Masansan
a matimudko ti ibit dagiti maladaga
a mawaw
iti kunnot, bisong ken apros dagiti inna
a napan nakigasanggasat
kadagiti adayo a daga.
Ditoy ti nangdungdung-awak
iti ubing a pimmusay a nangan iti basura
iti rumiet a kinapanglaw idiay Tondo,
idiay Santa Maria ken Darayday.
(Nagudua ti pusok idi magaburan
a sibibiag
dagiti kapatadana kadagiti gabsuon
a rukrukitenda idiay Payatas:
Siasino itan ti makalagip kadakuada?
Siasino ti mangituloy iti arapaapda?)
Ket ditoy, agitugkelak latta iti kandela
para kadakuada a biktima
dagiti arabas ti turay.
Ngamin, mangmangngegko ti timekko
iti timekda nga agbirbirok iti apuy ti init.


Iti parbangon rugiak ti agkali
iti balitok ti bulan.
Iti kalgaw ken tudtudo rambakak
dagiti babassit nga aramid
ti rikus ti inaldaw a panagbiag.
Ti danum isu ti dara ti daga
ti kasaor ti di aggibus nga angesna.


Ngem sibugak iti isem ti parbangon
ti katawa ti agsapa, sam-it iti dayyeng
iti aglikig
Ti unnot ken sirmata iti sardam.
Ditoy, inaldaw nga iwagaywayko
ti banderak
a mangidupag iti kunniber
sangsangit dagiti babassit
uray ti panaginkukuna, ti allilaw
dagiti ipagarup a kakabsat
a mabalin a pakapasagak.


Ay, dagiti sibeg a mata
kumalay-atda iti pagwanawanan
dagiti arrap a tarigagayda!
Ay, ti pait ken sam-it ti biag!


Agrangrangawak iti sabong
nga agar-arimasa iti linnaaw ti agsapa.
Ibaklayko ti sangolko
iti kelleng nga isu ti kararua
ti dios a saan a Makakita.



Originally published in Bannawag, the Ilokano weekly magazine

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

HAIL, AMERICA!













Hail, America!
Hail, Mighty America!

Damn the mass executioners!
Let them issue the edict with finality.
No to the ideologue's barbarity:

No paradise reception for body parts
No to infidel killers
and suicide bombers.

We are the world indivisible and one--
                              Pagans, Buddhists, Hindus, Shintos, Muslims, Taoists,
                                                  Sikhs, Jews, Christians.

Hail, America!
Hail, Mighty America!
God bless America!