{"id":409029,"date":"2024-05-20T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-20T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=409029"},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-29T14:00:00","slug":"May-is-Republika-ng-Pilipinas-PH-Heritage-Month","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/May-is-Republika-ng-Pilipinas-PH-Heritage-Month\/","title":{"rendered":"May is Republika ng Pilipinas PH Heritage Month"},"content":{"rendered":"

In honor of and with respect for Philippine Heritage Month in May I\u2019d like to share some Philippine poets with readers this week.<\/em><\/p>\n

WHAT POETRY DOES NOT SAY<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n

By Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta (musician and poet, 1932-2010)<\/p>\n

All shades of what is held Most dear most guarded<\/p>\n

are frailest, easily violated, and therefore most readily<\/p>\n

escape poetry\u2019s constraining Ministries: singular touch,<\/p>\n

a hurried whisper audible only to the mind\u2019s ear,<\/p>\n

a tune, a place, a fitful memory.<\/p>\n

For poetry never says; It unsays. To say is to confine, contain.<\/p>\n

To unsay is to explore the vaguely all-hovering presence<\/p>\n

of the unseen, deliberately left-out.<\/p>\n

BRINGING the DOLLS for ANYA<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n

By Merlie Alunan (b.1943)<\/p>\n

Two dolls in rags and tatters, one missing an arm and a leg,<\/p>\n

the other blind in one eye \u2013 I grabbed them from her arms,<\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d I said, \u201cthey cannot come,\u201d Each tight baggage I had<\/p>\n

packed only for the barest need: no room for sentiment or<\/p>\n

memory to clutter with loose ends my stern resolve, I reasoned,<\/p>\n

even a child must learn she cannot take what must be left behind.<\/p>\n

And so the boat turned seaward, a smart wind blowing dry the<\/p>\n

stealthy tears I could not wipe. Then I saw\u2014rags, tatters and all\u2014<\/p>\n

There among the neat trim packs, the dolls I ruled to leave behind.<\/p>\n

Her silence should have warned me she knew her burdens as I<\/p>\n

knew mine: her clean white years unlived\u2014and paid my price.<\/p>\n

She battened on a truth she knew I must own: when what\u2019s at<\/p>\n

stake is loyalty or love, hers are the true rights. Her own faiths<\/p>\n

she must keep, not I.<\/p>\n

NAGING BATO<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n

Poem by Ivy Alvarez.<\/p>\n

(Naging bato is a Filipino idiom meaning became valueless, lost,<\/p>\n

Frozen… literally turned into stone).<\/p>\n

If Medusa were Filipina, I would want her power. Many\u2019s the time<\/p>\n

when one of us is gazed upon without consequence, when one is<\/p>\n

apprised, judged, appraised, for sale and consumption. This will be<\/p>\n

an end to it. Imagine people scurrying and scrambling, abandoning<\/p>\n

their tilapias, their bago\u00f3ng, and tribal tattoos, their instances of<\/p>\n

condescension falling, like crumbs to the floor in their bid to avoid<\/p>\n

my gaze, and turn all their ideas of escapes as mere grooves and<\/p>\n

chipped messages in sandstone, small grass tongues tangle in my<\/p>\n

eyes, graze my ears with gentle portent, the wet hand on each fang<\/p>\n

a dew on my skin, aspirating blessings and curses in equal measure,<\/p>\n

which I save for later. The brine of my foremothers\u2019 sweat calls to<\/p>\n

me, their thirst ever\u2014and all\u2014encompassing.<\/p>\n

(Ivy Alvarez was born in the Philippines and raised in Australia, she lived in Scotland, Ireland and Wales before moving to Auckland, NZ in 2014)<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Joey aka “Pepe Batbon” Connolly is a retired educator who taught in the CNMI, NOLA, and LVNV. He is the Poet Laureate of Tinian and enjoys stargazing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In honor of and with respect for Philippine Heritage Month in May I\u2019d like to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-409029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}