As the first episode of the Philippines Graphic Literary Workshop (PGLW) slowly came to its conclusion on February 28, we knew that we had one more thing that we can offer our bright young fellows: a starting platform for their creative endeavors. Here, we present one of their final outputs from the workshop. We also asked them to provide an artwork that they think best represents their stories. Read on.
it was a bright day for a drowning color.
the blue sea looked calm, but it kept swallowing light. a wooden box drifted far from shore, rocking like it had grown tired of land. no name on it. the silence around it felt soft, almost careful, as if it too was learning how to float.
i stood there in yellow.
he once told me yellow was stubborn—the brightest among them all! it refuses to dim even when the sky turns cruel.
i met him in a room that smelled of paint and rain. he carried storms in his pocket; folded papers, scribbled lines, a small camera that blinked like a restless eye. he liked turning noise into something you could hold. like an alarm in the morning, waking everyone up that the world only changes when someone dares to name it.
i never meant to be named.
one afternoon we stood shoulder to shoulder, pretending the space between us was ordinary. it wasn’t. it hummed. the clouds thickened, rain fell, and i closed my eyes for a second too long. i leaned into him without thinking. beneath my ear, his heart knocked gently, steady and alive. i stayed there as if it were the safest place in the world.
he wrote a song soon after. he said it was about the sea. about longing. about colors meeting and becoming braver together. he never said it was about me. he didn’t need to.
at home, blue meant something else. heavy curtains. closed doors. a long table where papers slept in neat piles. once, i saw a folder slightly open. names lined in red. i looked away. i told myself blue was just a color.
but then, yellow and blue touched.
he learned where my blue came from. the shade that signs papers. the hue that hardens hands.
i am not the ocean, i told him.
but you carry its salt, he answered.
red roses and guns visited his street one night.
the sea received him before i could.
now the box drifts. i speak to it like it might forgive me. the tide reaches my feet, gentle, familiar.
blue and yellow make green. that is what they teach you. that when two colors meet, they become something new.
but no one tells you what happens when one color is taken away.
yellow does not turn green alone.
it only waits at the edge of the water,
aching for the blue that once held it.
and that is how yellows long for blues.
Si John Gabriel Rivera ay isang kabataang Pilipinong manunulatsay mula sa Rizal na lumilikha ng mga pelikulang mapagpalaya. May dala ang bawat kuwento niya ng adbokasiyang mapagpalaya. Isang paniniwalang sa pagbuo ng mga letra at titik, may mga salitang humuhubog at bumubuo sa pagkatao ng bawat mambabasa at manonood. Siya ay kalahok at nagwagi ng tropeo sa UP Cinema POV XXI at San Mateo, Rizal Film Festival.
Social account: @jhngbrielllll
