Poetry by Kang Kyunhee | October 12, 2008
I’m in a box-like world:
the classroom door,
the white board,
the desks
are all rectangular.
Maybe my heart is also rectangular,
hurting somebody with its four edges.
My notebook,
my ID,
my classmates’ bags
are all rectangular.
Nonfiction by Roselle Jimeno | October 12, 2008
At a certain time when everything seemed to be happening everywhere, except, perhaps the spot where I was—where I gazed, wide-eyed, caught up with the vastness of stagnation and void – there was a particular kind of impulse. It could be moral fiber; but really, it was just a matter of chance.
By chance I became a part of the Disaster Response Team of the Philippine National Red Cross in Davao City in 2006. My high school classmate called on one of those boring days during the semestral break, which I spent over-feeding fishes and coiling in the couch to watch Shrek for the nth time. He invited me for training on Disaster Management. Because I was hungry for something to happen, I was glad to be part of anything that could break my monotonous days. Besides, if there were a gang war in our ghettoized neighborhood in Santo Niño, Matina, I thought I might be able to help. Yet I had never thought I could respond to a disaster with a sense of planning and order. I was one of the most panicky people I knew. Then again, I attended the training despite my father’s displeasure, saying in his coarse voice that I am too frail and small, “basi ikaw pa’y tabangunon.”
The five-day training was attended by undergraduates from different colleges and universities in Davao City. Some of them came in batches of three and five. Almost half of the class were nursing students from Davao Doctors College. There were eighteen trainees and I was the only one who came from the University of the Philippines Mindanao.
Poetry by Macario Tiu | October 12, 2008
Ang dyipni drayber nagdaginot og pasahero
Yawat na lang makabawi kay mahal ang krudo
Ug iyang gipik-ap ang babayeng nagkargag bata
Sa gidiling sona diin naglurat ang dakong karatula
No Parking, No Loading, No Unloading
“Paspas kay dakpon ta,” matod sa drayber
Sa pasaherong nagtinikling sa guot nga sakyanan.
Apan kadakong demalas kay mas naglurat ang mata
Sa polis trapiko ug nasakpan ang drayber sa akto.
“Nganong namik-ap man kag pasahero
Nasayod man kang gidili dinhi kay makalangan sa trapiko?”
Nonfiction by Ricardo de Ungria | October 5, 2008
(Excerpt from Keynote Speech delivered during the Gintong Aklat Awards 2008, SMEX Convention Center, Bay Area, Pasay City)
Recent events in our history, specifically in the past twenty years or so, have more than less convinced me that ours is a culture not of ideas and intellection but of emotions, hints, and suspicions. Our predilection is for the unsaid or the merely implied, the shadowy and adumbrated, the peripheral and the underground as appropriate instruments to counter what has been perceived as the given brutality of power and force exercised by the few oligarchs and pseudo-monarchs in appropriate political positions. The dynamics in our culture is such that there seems to be always an agon between the outer and the inner, between the overt and the secret, the official and the unofficial, mainstream and underground—with the outer and overt and official conceived of as tyrannically powerful and repressive, and the inner and secret and unofficial wielded as a submissive and abiding force whose time will eventually come. Continue reading The Book, the True, and the Beautiful
Poetry by Arian Rey Tejano, Josie Jane Balabag | October 5, 2008
Talinis ang kilat.
Ang ulan murag bildo nga nangatagak
sa karsada, saba.
Gipugos nako akong mata nga mupiyong,
pero dili gyud madala.
Ang akong hunahuna
dili gyud magpamando
kay gusto gyud niya nga maminaw
sa mga tingog sa dalugdog.
Nagsige kog ligid-ligid
sa akong higdaanan,
dili tungod kay sakit
ang kawayan nga walay banig,
dili tungod kay wala koy habol ug unlan.
Taod-taod,
moabot na pud siya nga magbarag-barag.
Makabalo gyud baya siya
nga nagpaatik-atik ra ko’g tulog
kay akong mata nagpituk-pitok.
Nikusog ang dalugdog
sama sa kakusog sa latos sa akong dughan.
Nikusog pud ang tagaktak sa ulan,
murag bildong manusok sa akong tiyan
dili tungod sa kagutom
kundili tungod sa pakang
sa iyang bakus.
Continue reading Usa ka gabiing dili makatulog si Matet / A Night when Matet Could Not Sleep
Poetry by Henrietta Diana de Guzman | September 28, 2008
Wa pa gani miusbaw ang adlaw
Si Tiya, nagsugod nag latagaw
Sa gawas sa balay ginasugdan
chismis na murag way kahumanan.
“Dre’, kabaw baka sa nahitabo?”
“Day, kabaw ko unsa iyang tuyo.”
“Ay da! Baho daw kag ilok..”
“Siya? Tamad daw ug palahubog.”
“Unsa? Iya nang gi- ‘storya Piling?”
“Kabaga baya sa iyang aping!”
“Nya, puti ba di ay iyang ilok?”
“Bagag nawng! Mura bayag mulihok!”
Continue reading Ang Tsismosang si Tiya Piling
Play by Yas Ocampo | September 28, 2008
This play was performed last February at the UP Mindanao, with Maureen Ronquillo as Veronica and Erika Navaja as Apple.
Cast of Characters:
Apple, 22 – a call center agent
Veronica, 42 – Mr. Sacks’ wife
Setting: The stage is divided into two: on one side, a table where Apple is stationed (her office desk in Davao), on another a couch and a coffee table (Veronica’s house in the United Kingdom.) It is daytime on Veronica’s side of the set and nighttime on Apple’s. Both of them are seated on their side of the stage as the play begins.
(Apple starts making a call through her cellular phone. The pauses in between her sentences must be presumed to be answered by an absent “other line.”)
Apple: Hey babe – wait, sino to? Dan? Girl ka ba? Boy. Dan. Good. Uhm. Kay Jun nga. Uhm, kasama mo ba siya, no wait (snickers), silly me, (British accent) of course kasama mo siya, duh, phone niya to. (trying to flirt with Dan) hey listen, Dan, could you be an angel and give the phone to Jun please? What do you mean he’s in the shower? Oh, he’s coming, coming out now? Oh, O.K. Kaw naman, you’re such a joker ha, naked siya ka jan. Huuuy, Jun. Sino ba yun? Ang lambot magsalita! Wala lang. (snickers.) Kumusta? Hey, listen, you free mamaya, I mean, tomorrow, when I get off work? I mean, I think I still have energy for a little, you know, breakfast. Well, you know, wala lang, I kinda miss you na kasi. I know, I know. Well, you know – ano ba to. Friendly breakfast – naman. Duh, I got over you na kaya! Treat ko. Sweldo ko kasi ngayon. I know this little place where –. Oh, okay. Oh, you’re going out tonight. Sa MTS? Kasama si Dan. Kaw talaga, tulad mo yung friend mo ah, lumalambot na ang words. Pwede sama? Joke lang. I have to work pa eh, I mean, unless you want me not to. Oh. Ba’t naman di pwede? Ah, ganon. Haaay. Wala lang, I’m so bored. Shift starts in a few minutes. But, wala lang. Huy, ang sweet niyo naman jan. Kayo na ba? Joke lang… Uy, alam mo ba – there was this one time, I was waiting for a jeep home, tapos yun, it was around 3 a. m., tapos yun, a guy there, he was asking for my number, tapos. Hello? Jun? Hello. Jun.
Poetry by Mark Darryl Caniban | September 28, 2008
Gabi’t ang kulisap lamang ang tanging
Umiikot sa lamparang nagngingingas sa tabi ng baul.
Hinipan ko ang alab nito’t
Napawi ang ilaw sa apat ng sulok nitong kwarto.
Tanging ang ilaw ng buwan ang sumisilip
Mula sa mga butas ng kawayang dingding.
Gabi’t ang at ingay ng hilik mo ang tanging
Pumupuno sa dampang tahanan ng ating pag-ibig.
Continue reading Asawa ni Jose