NORTHERN MINDANAO
1.) THE FLOOD STORY
Igorot
Once upon a time, when the world was flat and there were no mountains, there lived two brothers, sons of Lumawig, the Great Spirit. The brothers were fond of hunting, and since no mountains had formed there was no good place to catch wild pig and deer, and the older brother said:"Let us cause water to flow over all the world and cover it, and then mountains will rise up." 97
So they caused water to flow over all the earth, and when it was covered they took the head-basket 98 of the town and set it for a trap. The brothers were very much pleased when they went to look at their trap, for they had caught not only many wild pigs and deer but also many people.
Now Lumawig looked down from his place in the sky and saw that his sons had flooded the earth and that in all the world there was just one spot which was not covered. And he saw that all the people in the world had been drowned except one brother and sister who lived in Pokis.
Then Lumawig descended, and he called to the boy and girl, saying:
"Oh, you are still alive."
"Yes," answered the boy, "we are still alive, but we are very cold."
So Lumawig commanded his dog and deer to get fire 99 for the boy and girl. The dog and the deer swam quickly away, but though Lumawig waited a long time they did not return, and all the time the boy and girl were growing colder.
Finally Lumawig himself went after the dog and the deer, and when he reached them he said:
"Why are you so long in bringing the fire to Pokis? Get ready and come quickly while I watch you, for the boy and girl are very cold."
Then the dog and the deer took the fire and started to swim through the flood, but when they had gone only a little way the fire was put out.
Lumawig commanded them to get more fire and they did so, but they swam only a little way again when that of the deer went out, and that of the dog would have been extinguished also had not Lumawig gone quickly to him and taken it.
As soon as Lumawig reached Pokis he built a big fire which warmed the brother and sister; and the water evaporated so that the world was as it was before, except that now there were mountains. The brother and sister married and had children, and thus there came to be many people on the earth.
Our Overseas Contract Workers are the new heroes
of the Philippines --Fidel V. Ramos
In Hong Kong last summer
my office mate and I took
turns, smiling for pictures
in front of "The Court of Final
Appeal," as a joke, or maybe
in a kind of atonement--because
two women boarding the same
ferry we took that morning said,
in the dialect they were sure
we would recognize, Is it
your day off too?
One of them had a quick, nervous way
of smiling, as if ready to take it back
if we had turned on them with
indignation. The other was clearly
ready to challenge, if the well-
intentioned expression of solidarity
were read otherwise. It was a day
filled with rainclouds, a sky
the color of aluminum, the dull
sheen on the inside of an old
rice cooker.
Yes, we smiled, it's our day, off
too. Is your amo kind? ventured the younger
of the two, shyly. Yes, we said, thinking of the air-
conditioned offices and computers we had left behind
for two weeks of r & r, as we leant back on the green
railing. The boat punched forward, toward the red
and yellow buildings, the rickshaws lined up
in the shade.
Mine too, she said; now. But the first one…
and her voice trailed like a scarf over the water,
hesitating. We had to force our way in,
said her friend, picking up the thread. I called
the center, you know, the one near the church?
Migrante. She was this close to being raped.
Did you hear about the last one? The one
who threw herself off the hospital roof?
Instead of an autopsy they scraped
her insides clean, stuffed her
with cotton. Now no one can
prove anything.
If the body can keep secrets, what can it tell
of them? The body as a scroll: what calligraphy,
what message, did that woman's family unwrap
when they received her body aerogrammed
in a bronze casket? For so many dollars,
you can get your name carved
in ideographs on an inked stamp
that is also called a chop.
The shy one asks me to braid her hair.
She calls me ate, older sister. She shows me
the scar on her left leg from shimmying
down a mango tree in their old backyard
at home. She has just turned nineteen,
and her smile can still be
warm as a ripe mango.
I run my fingers through the ink of her hair,
dividing into three sections. What was loose
and rippling in the wind, she has let me gather
in my hand. I braid, picking up the faint scent
of coconut oil; yeasty, warm, like good bread,
rising. She could be my daughter, my niece,
my cousin, my best friend.
Our new friends take us to the Central Station
where they will share a picnic meal
with others: garlic pork and rice, sour
broth, rice cakes, meat stewed in blood
gravy. They will talk, exchange
numbers, letters, news of better
openings, the meanings of insults
in a foreign language; pictures of grade
school children proudly stepping up
to receive medals on closing
day at school. Their hands
the size of their sleeping
quarters.
Even on their day off, the army
ponders the different ways
to share strength in the many
lands of the enemy, abroad
where they are known
by only one
name.
©1998 by Luisa A. Igloria
Half of the world's true glamour
Is held--you know by whom?
Not by the gilt Four Hundred
Parading in perfume,
Nor by the silvered meteors
That light the celluloid sky--
But by these eyes that called you,
Blind fool who passed me by!
If I still think of her today
Why didn't I tell her long ago?
I could have saved all wondering
For I'd have peace if I did know.
If I had learned of metaphors
Before I wondered 'bout the stars
Would I have written verses then
And worshipped Venus instead of Mars?
If I had found my tongue could rhyme
Would I have shown a face sans mask,
A heart unsure? But woe is me--
I'll never know, I didn't ask.
©2001 by H.O. Santos
we have all trundled down
glabrous
slopes
of futility:
where giants woods
(from which
d
a
n
g
l
e
twines of thought one swings from
serially, mischievously, Tarzan-like)
give way to
endless
miles
of desiccation.
where now,
never-known and never-reached,
desolate
ideas brown themselves ugly,
dead
clumps of soil
the rain forgot.
believe me.
we have all felt parched.
we have all lifted callused hands
up to the sky,
chanting self-consciously:
rain me thoughts,
rain me words,
rain me a river of reason.