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Poetry
Asylum pieces
at 53
my sinfulness pervades the daily news
and “justifies all my childhood abuse”—
i thank all for the times when I can choose
to turn to earthly and heavenly hues
and true forms and movements and sounds profuse,
and fall out of the war of wordy views
to forge...
My only sin
Nothing
in my garden of chrysanthemum
can make me smile
not the clutch of winged Monarchs
perched on my rosals,
neither fishbones nor the trees
I had long since abandoned
the cello for leeches in the lawn
and for the din of infant years
For at the top of my voice
I can...
Excerpts from Aswang Love
The following poems are part of an in-progress novel-in-poems that tells the story of two aswang lovers. Clara is a manananggal vampire and Santiago is a shapeshifting weredog in 1936 Cutud village. They fall in love and try to live as ordinary humans...
Ghost knocking
She left him nothing,
not a word, not even
a single letter. But everywhere
he turned, he could feel
her cupped hand riding
a plank the shape of a heart,
brass castors and wheels
of bone slowly churning,
searching. He closed his eyes
and saw letters carved in reverse
against wood, her hand
making...
One week on a cliff’s edge, overlooking the sea
These waves roar past, a hundred feet tall, smashing through the rocks beneath.
Carving out a hollow space out of the stone, that in a hundred years will leave this edge
teetering and fragile. The waves come
rolling in, one after another,
not even allowing one a...
Ang bigat
Nasalo ko sa tingin mong pabaya ako sa sarili.
Nakuha ko ang iniisip mong wala akong pinipiling pagkain.
Bitbit ko ang inaasahan mong palatawa ako’t masayahin.
Kipkip ko ang biro mong malamang na ako’y biritera
At sa mga videoke session ay siguradong bibida.
Kalong ko ang papuring lahat...
