How do you write a poem?

Poetry by | December 14, 2008

How do you give birth to beautiful thoughts?
How do you pull the stars, the ocean, and the sunset
Towards a piece of paper?
How do you convince the angels to whisper and coach you?
Or the devils, to just sit and listen?
How do you tell the pen
To write something meaningful?
Something people will look for?
Something they will tell their friends about?
How do you generate colors from a black-inked pen?
How do you write with a smile in your voice?
How do you match the right words?
How do you summon the nicest punctuations?
How do you arrange everyday expressions
To form a symphony?
How do you liven up a dormant heart,
A dead emotion,
An indifferent soul?
How do you write a poem?

—-
Karla Stefan Singson is a 4th year Marketing student and the president of the debating club of the Ateneo de Davao University.

A Rainy Day

Poetry by | December 14, 2008

A canopy of dark clouds
hovers above the city
like an old newspaper
covering a dead body.
Another victim
of the Davao Death Squad.
It never fails.
I see other headlines of death,
a barangay official ambushed,
an innocent citizen stabbed to death
while falling in line
to buy two kilos of NFA rice.
Media men being harassed.
It never fails to rain
in the afternoon or at night
the way people never fail to fill
the city’s square,
men of different ages and from different classes,
men seeking the company of others.
And then when it rains I wonder,
Does the greasy man in black ever sleep?
Does he ever drink coffee?
Does he ever like the rain?

—-
Myan May G. Declaro hails from Surigao del Sur and is currently a senior BA English – Creative Writing student of UP Mindanao.

On Language and Education

Nonfiction by | December 14, 2008

As far possible the instruction should be given by English-speaking native teachers, but not necessarily in the English language. Unless the American teacher learns the native dialect, the native must learn English in order that through it he may acquire our ideas. In the imparting of these ideas to native children neither he (the teacher) nor they (the native children) should be hampered by requiring that the ideas should be conveyed through the medium of English.

Even among Filipino schools taught in English, the visitor must be impressed by the enormous waste of time in teaching children the essential things, a knowledge of which is needed by them at once. The native teacher has in several years’ course of training by American teachers, learned fairly well many American ideas, but has poorly learned the English language. Instead of immediately communicating the ideas to his pupils in a language common to both, he wastes years of their time and his in attempting to get ideas into their heads through a language which is foreign to both of them and in which he is not a competent instructor.

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Urban Legends

Nonfiction by | December 7, 2008

Ang Babaye sa Salamin
Giasoy ni Elmer Oncada, Ateneo de Davao University

Gikan ni sa akong kaubanan sa una, kadtong wala pa ninghawa dinhi. Gikan siya og CR. Karon pagpanamin niya sa Del Rosario Building sa panlalaki na CR sa ground, nanudlay siya. Mga 9:30. Pagpanamin niya, atol pod to og kalag-kalag hinuon. Tingala siya naa may babaye na puti og buhok ug puti pod ang sanina. Kuyawan siya. Nanindog iyang mga balahibo. Paglingi niya sa likod, nawala man og kalit.

So unsay gibuhat niya? Dali-dali siyag suot sa iyang uniporme. Dagan siya, dagan. Tingala mi pag-abot dinhi. “Ngano naghangos-hangos man ka?”

“Buanga, bay. Nag-CR ko sa Del Rosario, naay babayeng nagpakita sa akoa, puti tanan.”

White lady ba to or unsa to siya. Taas daw kaayo og buhok. Gitan-aw siya sa samin.

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Mingaw

Poetry by | December 7, 2008

gimingaw na ko sa davao
sa baho sa durian,
sa kahumot sa barbikyu sa
delongtes,
sa kalami sa ice cold beer sa bakbak,
c5, taboan…

gimingaw na ko kang
marissa,
na nagsuroy og maruya kada
alas tres sa hapon –
gisum-ol na ko
sa potato chips,
“hastang parata!”
sa kagahi sa bagel
na gipalit sa bruegger’s.

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Ako at ang Syudad

Poetry by | December 7, 2008

Puta ang turing ko sa syudad
sa mga sandaling kinukumutan
ng kulay abo ang kalangitan.

Nagmemeyk-ap ng maputlang ilaw
upang ikubli ang mga bitak at dungis
ng bawat edipisyo, iskinita’t kanto.

Nagsusuot ng mga karatulang
bumabakat sa mga panindang
nangangako ng kaluwalhatian.

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The Sound of Rust (an excerpt)

Fiction by | November 30, 2008

I was staring at the Christmas lights outside Kenny’s when Rust came. I, Kristine, and Paulo were already there finishing up a Junior Lapad. We decided to wait for Rust before bringing out the longneck.

“He’s here!” shouted Kristine, obviously tipsy.

Paulo then stood up and went to the counter to get the longneck.

“Hi, Sigil!” Kristine greeted Rust when he got inside the carinderia. She leaned her chair back to look at Rust. I was thinking that she might fall and break something. Luckily, Rust was there to grab on to the back of the chair, preventing a mishap. What the hell was she thinking anyway?

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A Distant Country

Poetry by | November 30, 2008

This is the curve of the cheek
that I once explored with kisses.
This is the cave of the mouth
where I once blew in breath
whose wetness I tasted.
This is the hillock of the nose
where I once rubbed my own
on an idle summer day
when we ran through the fields.
These are the wings of the eyelids
that fluttered to life
at my slightest whisper.
These are the pools of the eyes
into which I lost my soul.

Now a distant country, only
half-remembered.

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