bopis

May laptop ako sa panaginip. Maroon ang kulay at kawangis ng katawan ng coleman ang materyal. May istrap ang laptop ko kaya maaaring dalhin na style backpack. Ito lang ang dala ko papuntang Santolan. Kailangang inspeksyunin ang laptop sa bungad ng MRT(7). Nakaaasar sapagkat kailangan kong magmadali. Tahimik lang ako. Pinsan ko ang guwardiya(10). Tinanong niya sa akin kung nais ko talagang sumakay. Sabi ko, oo. Kukuha raw kasi siya ng espesyalista. Pumasok siya sa opisina. Lumabas si Guingona at umupo sa turnstile. Gamit ang mga screwdriver at plais, binuksan niya ang laptop at ininspeksyon ang kada piyesa. Sa susunod na eksena, nagpupusoy kami ng pinsan ko sa hardin sa Odiongan(15). Nakasando siya, saudi gold sa leeg at daliri, at pantalon at bota ng militar. Magiliw kaming naglalaro(19), naghihiwa ng manggang hilaw, at nagmumurahan.

Mga sipi:
7—Kinabahan ako sa bahaging ito, marami akong inisip na excuse sakaling may makita sila.
10—Patay na ang aking pinsan. Hindi siya kailanman naging sundalo o guwardiya. Hindi na umabot ng bente kuwatro, sa pagkakaalala ko.
15—Isang beses lang ako nakabisita sa hardin na ito. Hindi pa ako nagtagal noon, sinamahan lang ang aking ninang na magyosi. Ngayon ko lang natandaan ang isang panaginip sa Romblon.
19—Hindi ko alam kung sino ang nananalo. Okey lang kung siya. Panaginip ko naman e.

Etiquetas: damgo

Again and again, the Botanical Garden. No matter how nature makes me feel at home – like Hey your blood drinks of the same sun, says the leaf, so cheers! – the source connects to me in these “places of nature” in many different ways. For example, the flora of Diliman reeks too much of nostalgia to be considered natural; red seethes so from Mountain Blank – and the green stench hunting ever so near – that my bones cannot rest there and my ears are thrilled even in sleep; Makiling whispers betrayal with clear intent so that even her stones seem to me crystallized hate; and the lake that we called “sea” when we were children by the Quisao shore remains ignorant. Always, in these “pockets of nature,” something that keeps me from a clear voice. I taste nature – more precisely, Nature in Me – on the bus that speeds through the South Luzon Expressway. Tears come to me when I see those trees, all of them strangers. In a moment, even if I already anticipate the moment, I suddenly feel they are kin. Not merely know, mind you. Feel: a more biblical sort of know. My motion and motor somehow connected to the primal stirrings of bark and root, wired to their wind-obscured stillness. The red curtains and the rain-stained glass do not deceive me. They too are nature. This brings me to thinking: maybe I must begin with strangers to understand. The mute trees seem to me most eloquent, while the leafless tree in Lukutang Maliit was etched by a foolish heart – mine, yes – so I fail to hear its throb. The Fertility Tree offers me such density of meaning that I am deaf to the spirit in it that is also me and is also the Big Bang and is also the clouds that sucked water from the bodies of my granderparents. But again, the Botanical Garden. The garden always slaps me with the inviolable presence of the thick date palm under whose shadow a Master denied me tutelage. This rejection is cool water, sweeter to me than love. Still, it remains a dismissal of such substance that the tree, the soil, and most of Laguna stay imperceptible to me.

Etiquetas: woman19

Panaginip ng videoke. Malaki ang makina at walang tigil ang kanta at inom.(3) Hindi ko maalala ang imahe sa makina. May away na mula pa sa unang panaginip ko na hindi ko maaaring isulat. May dalang barena ang aking tiyo. Kaaway niya ang videoke na dinuduro niya ng barena. May lupa at ugat-ugat pa sa dulo ng barena ngunit kita pa rin ang tilos ng bakal. Nagstatic ang makina. Tuloy ang kantahan, medyo pabulong na nga lang. Todo ngiti(9) pa rin ang mga humahawak ng bote at mikropono. Galit na galit ang tiyo sa videoke.

Mga sipi:
3—Kadalasang mababa ang tingin ko sa mga kantahan at inuman. Kaya nga masaya ang mga gawaing ito dahil aminadong mababaw. Ngunit hindi ganito ang "saya" sa eksenang ito. Payapang uri ng saya. Malapit sa pakiramdam ng piknik sa maaaliwalas na umaga sa ilalim ng malayabong na puno.
9—Hindi ngiting aso. Tamang inumang ngiti. Hindi wholesome pero ngunit hindi kuntodo bangag. Natutuwa talaga sila sa kantahan. Kung natutuwa sila sa tiyo ko, hindi ko alam. Mula sa pagkakapanood ko, parang okey lang. Parang alam nilang naroon siya ngunit talagang ang kanta ang mahalaga sa kanila.

Etiquetas: damgo

Summer, and under the shade of a shut up Carillon, I begin the practice of distance. Beloved will work elsewhere, live elsewhere, leaving her incandescent metaphors. Co-teachers stay, but do they really? Do I know who they will be besides their same names and sane faces? Also, students go. That’s what they’re supposed to do, study and go. What I hear are tricycles and people cooing at their expensive dogs and the wind that hisses and hints at a catalog of all that I do not hear. And will never. Friends stop the flow of words dead and the only way these could live is to say them again and again until I wear the meaning out of them, like how imagine there were once cities back in the day when Makiling held back her volcano words. Then the accursed snakebird brought her a gift, the thought she might one day lose them, these people she loved. Already missing them, she sang her grief and she cried and she sang. It was in this manner of fire that she lost them. It would be 300,000 years before a university was possible. When I entered this university four years ago, there was kapok in the air and a tower could yet sing.

Etiquetas: woman19