Poetry

Brighter than a thousand suns, / am become Death. Yet, as atoms split, re-configure, they sometimes moderate to re-arrange the glories in the bud, the splendours in the bush. Under a cleansing Heaven, life re-bIooms, charged and changed through a quiet, latent in that self- propelling spirit, there since our isIands’ birth.

Each Sunday I see him seated on the church steps, bedraggled clothes, white hair and beard, as I arrive for the last Mass, head bowed almost to his...

  tiwarik at yukyok ako’y nanahan sa kweba ni Inang tigib ng karimlan   ikasiyam na buwa’y dumatal supling ng uniberso’y iniluwal   Nagkangipi’t nagkabulbol Saka naging suhi   Sa sansina- pupunang Nagdadalang- muhi.

  Like a shoebox cramped with preserved Fragments of quite a life lived by—the letters From a childhood friend, puppy love remembered A ribbon, the first book gifted,...

  As a child I was taught never To curse the rain, no matter the floods Or the roof blown off due to howling Wind, indeed never mind...

Everyone says that Red is the color Of love and passion Which adds meaning to lovers’ days and inflames their hungry nights Yet some of us forget That red is blood Personifying...

  to Bea Yap Martinez   Banished from a house in havoc, a broken vase, a curtain on fire,   I tiptoe here to hide, a child enisled in a labyrinth of green,   crouching...

Akala ko, ang pag-iibigan Ay pag-uusap lamang At malagkit na tititigan. Akala ko, ang pag-iibigan Ay paghahawakan lamang ng kamay. Akala ko ang pag-iibigan Ay puro saya’t wala nang lumbay. Akala...

Dahil ba ako'y bata Ikaw ay walang awa? Kung manlaban mahina, Murang-mura ang diwa.   Dahil ba di mo kaya Yaong mas matatanda, Sa akin ibalandra Ang 'di magawa-gawa.   Dahil nga ako'y bata, Naiisip...