For the City that Nearly Broke Me, a work in progress Ang sakit ng kalingkigan, sakit ng buong katawan. –Tagalog Salawikain
1. Taga Ilog I was hoping I’d see someone else; not you, suffocating your children in your full skirt’s folded barbs. Hooded ladrones, bones jutting, skin abscessed, discarded bodies. At your banks, dengue fever swarms, thirsting. Flowers with basura drift, toxic, silted, rank. Into your murmuring waters, Rizal’s moon once spilled his verse, and your whims once swallowed bridges alive. Now, we sing your dirge, snaking giant, you who named our fathers’ tongue.
2. Estero hypodermic needle sludge, dying animals, human rot, water so thick, rats race across its oily surface. i am of here, in this box
twenty souls share no light but what we have stolen from night’s frayed wires. i am of here, and cockroaches share my bed floorspace corner tarp and scrap adjacent to the floor’s open mouth, slum toilet, river below. i am of no name streets here, patron saint of splayed bare feet and black mud, chicken wire, polystyrene islands, every thing you no longer desire.
3. Junto al Pasig Rosas, claveles, Pásig ameno, Luce con galas mil; –Jose Rizal, Junto al Pasig
River of mangrove ghost Divina aurora River of trench latrine
Su hermoso cielo River of stagnant stink Viste de luz gentil River of giardia Sus ojos son divinos River of typhoid rash Su frente el rosicler River of sunken barge Sus labios purpurinos River of DDT El pecho hacen arder River of biosolid dredge En tí, dulce hermosura River of blooming cholera La mente segura va River of corroded pipe En tí, rica ventura River of arsenic groundwater El alma feliz tendrá.
4. San Francisco de las Lágrimas Ang lakas ko ay nalipat, Sa puso’t dibdib ng lahat; Kung nais ninyong akoy mabuhay, Pag-ibig ko’y inyong ibigay.
–Nicanor Abelardo, “Mutya ng Pasig”
Praised be You my Lord, through Brother Sun Petroleum fumes burn my eyes, my lungs It hurts when I breathe, it hurts when I don’t
Praised be You my Lord, through Brother Air High from inhaling gasoline vapors Headrushing’s made me a true blue junkie
Praised be You my Lord, through Sister Water I bathe in her, I drink her tears Collected in cisterns, poison rain
Praised be You my Lord, through Brother Fire I erupt in bleeding ulcers and boils My body, a cancerous tree in bloom
5. Villa White walls, high and tipped with glass shards, ringed barbwire. Iron gates veil tiled manors, bougainvillea, servants haunting. Porcelain teacups steam, poised
ladies hushed, their papaya scented bodies sloughed tender, phantasms, translucent.
6. San Andres Apostol Patron saint of fishermen Pray for our rancid waters
Patron saint of fishmongers Our pockets are always empty
Patron saint of maidens Our virtue again under threat
Patron saint of spinsters Let us not die in dementia
Patron saint of rope-makers Our nooses chafe our throats
Patron saint of songsters Our throats are oozing sores
7. Blepharoplasty
When the eyelids are scalpeled suture cysts may ensue, and suboptimally placed incisions may cause excessive scarring. The surgical fold renders eyelids unnatural for the Oriental face. Overflow tearing, hollowness are possible side effects.