1 Although the heart may care no more, the mind can always recall. The mind can always recall, for there are always things to remember: languid days of depressed boyhood; shared happy days under the glare of the sun; concealed love and mocking fate; etc. So I suppose you remember me too.
2 Remember? A little over a year after I was orphaned, my aunt decided to turn me over to your father, the Datu. In those days datus were supposed to take charge of the poor and the helpless. Therefore, my aunt only did right in placing me under the wing of your father. Furthermore, she was so poor, that by doing that, she not only relieved herself of the burden of poverty but also safeguarded my well-being.
3 But I could not bear the thought of even a moment’s separation from my aunt.
She had been like a mother to me, and would always be.
4 “Please, Babo,” I pleaded. “Try to feed me a little more. Let me grow big with you, and I will build you a house. I will repay you some day. Let me do something to help, but please, Babo, don’t send me away....” I really cried.
5 Babo placed a soothing hand on my shoulder. Just like the hand of Mother. I felt a bit comforted, but presently I cried some more. The effect of her hand was so stirring.
6 “Listen to me. Stop crying—oh, now, do stop. You see, we can’t go on like this,”
Babo said. “My mat-weaving can’t clothe and feed both you and me. It’s really hard, son, it’s really hard. You have to go. But I will be seeing you every week.
You can have everything you want in the Datu’s house.”
7 I tried to look at Babo through my tears. But soon, the thought of having everything I wanted took hold of my child’s mind. I ceased crying.
8 “Say you will go,” Babo coaxed me. I assented finally, I was only five then—very tractable.
9 Babo bathed me in the afternoon. I did not flinch and shiver, for the sea was comfortably warm, and exhilarating. She cleaned my fingernails meticulously.
Then she cupped a handful of sand, spread it over my back, and rubbed my grimy body, particularly the back of my ears. She poured fresh water over me afterwards. How clean I became! But my clothes were frayed....
10 Babo instructed me before we left for your big house: I must not forget to kiss your father’s feet, and to withdraw when and as ordered without turning my back; I must not look at your father full in the eyes; I must not talk too much; I must always talk in the third person; I must not... Ah, Babo, those were too many to remember.
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11 Babo tried to be patient with me. She tested me over and over again on those royal, traditional ways. And one thing more: I had to say “Pateyk” for yes, and
“Teyk” for what, or for answering a call.
12 “Oh, Babo, why do I have to say all those things? Why really do I have...”
13 “Come along, son; come along.”
14 We started that same afternoon. The breeze was cool as it blew against my face.
We did not get tired because we talked on the way. She told me so many things.
She said you of the big house had blue blood.
15 “Not red like ours, Babo?”
16 Babo said no, not red like ours.
17 “And the Datu has a daughter my age, Babo?”
18 Babo said yes—you. And I might be allowed to play with you, the Datu’s daughter, if I worked hard and behaved well.
19 I asked Babo, too, if I might be allowed to prick your skin to see if you had the blue blood, in truth. But Babo did not answer me anymore. She just told me to keep quiet. There, I became so talkative again.
20 Was that really your house? My, it was so big! Babo chided me. “We don’t call it a house,” she said. “We call it astana, the house of the Datu.” So I just said oh, and kept quiet. Why did Babo not tell me that before?
21 Babo suddenly stopped in her tracks. Was I really very clean? Oh, oh, look at my harelip. She cleaned my harelip, wiping away with her tapis the sticky mucus of the faintest conceivable green flowing from my nose. Poi! Now it was better.
Although I could not feel any sort of improvement in my deformity itself. I merely felt cleaner.
22 Was I truly the boy about whom Babo was talking? You were laughing, young pretty Blue Blood. Happy perhaps that I was. Or was it the amusement brought about by my harelip that had made you laugh. I dared not ask you. I feared that should you come to dislike me, you’d subject me to unpleasant treatment. Hence,
I laughed with you, and you were pleased.
23 Babo told me to kiss your right hand. Why not your feet? Oh, you were a child yet. I could wait until you had grown up.
24 But you withdrew your hand at once. I think my harelip gave it a ticklish sensation. However, I was so intoxicated by the momentary sweetness the action brought me that I decided inwardly to kiss your hand everyday. No, no, it was not love. It was only an impish sort of liking. Imagine the pride that was mine to be thus in close heady contact with one of the blue blood....
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25 “Welcome, little orphan!” Was it for me? Really for me? I looked at Babo. Of course it was for me! We were generously bidden in. Thanks to your father’s kindness. And thanks to your laughing at me, too.
26 I kissed the feet of your Appah, your old, honorable, resting-the-whole-day father. He was not tickled by my harelip as you were. He did not laugh at me. In fact, he evinced compassion towards me. And so did your Amboh, your kind mother. “Sit down, sit down; don’t be ashamed.”
27 But there you were, plying Babo with your heartless questions: Why was I like that? What had happened to me?
28 To satisfy you, pretty Blue Blood, little inquisitive One, Babo had to explain: Well,
Mother had slid in the vinta in her sixth month with the child that was me.
Result: my harelip. “Poor Jaafar,” your Appah said. I was about to cry, but seeing you looking at me, I felt so ashamed that I held back the tears. I could not help being sentimental, you see. I think my being bereft of parents in youth had much to do with it all.
29 “Do you think you will be happy to stay with us? Will you not yearn any more for your Babo?”
30 “Pateyk, I will be happy,” I said. Then the thought of my not yearning any more for Babo made me wince. But Babo nodded at me reassuringly.
31 “Pateyk, I will not yearn any more for... for Babo.”
32 And Babo went before the interview was through. She had to cover five miles before evening came. Still I did not cry, as you may have expected I would, for— have I not said it?—I was ashamed to weep in your presence.
33 That was how I came to stay with you, remember? Babo came to see me every week as she had promised. And you—all of you—had a lot of things to tell her.
That I was a good worker—oh, beyond question, your Appah and Amboh told
Babo. And you, out-spoken little Blue Blood, joined the flattering chorus. But my place of sleep always reeked of urine, you added, laughing. That drew a rallying admonition from Babo, and a downright promise from me not to wet my mat again.
34 Yes, Babo came to see me, to advise me every week, for two consecutive years— that is, until death took her away, leaving no one in the world but a nephew with a harelip.
35 Remember? I was your favorite and you wanted to play with me always. I learned why after a time, it delighted you to gaze at my harelip. Sometimes, when we went out wading to the sea, you would pause and look at me. I would look at you, too, wondering. Finally, you would be seized by a fit of laughter. I would chime in, not realizing I was making fun of myself. Then you would pinch me painfully to make me cry. Oh, you wanted to experiment with me. You could not tell, you said, whether I cried or laughed: the working of lips was just the same in either to your gleaming eyes. And I did not flush with shame even if you said so. For after all, had not my mother slid in the vinta?
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36 That was your way. And I wanted to pay you back in my own way. I wanted to prick your skin and see if you really had blue blood. But there was something about you that warned me against a deformed orphan’s intrusion. All I could do, then, was to feel foolishly proud, cry and laugh with you—for you—just to gratify the teasing, imperious blue blood in you. Yes, I had my way, too.
37 Remember? I was apparently so willing to do anything for you. I would climb for young coconuts for you. You would be amazed by the ease and agility with which
I made my way up the coconut tree, yet fear that I would fall. You would implore me to come down at once, quick. “No.” You would throw pebbles at me if I thus refused to come down. No, I still would not. Your pebbles could not reach me— you were not strong enough. You would then threaten to report me to your
Appah. “Go ahead.” How I liked being at the top! And sing there as I looked at you who were below. You were so helpless. In a spasm of anger, you would curse me, wishing my death. Well, let me die. I would climb the coconut trees in heaven. And my ghost would return to deliver... to deliver young celestial coconuts to you. Then you would come back. You see? A servant, an orphan, could also command the fair and proud Blue Blood to come or go.
38 Then we would pick up little shells, and search for sea-cucumbers; or dive for sea-urchins. Or run along the long stretch of white, glaring sand, I behind you— admiring your soft, nimble feet and your flying hair. Then we would stop, panting, laughing.
39 After resting for a while, we would run again to the sea and wage war against the crashing waves. I would rub your silky back after we had finished bathing in the sea. I would get fresh water in a clean coconut shell, and rinse your soft, ebony hair. Your hair flowed down smoothly, gleaming in the afternoon sun. Oh, it was beautiful. Then I would trim your fingernails carefully. Sometimes you would jerk with pain. Whereupon I would beg you to whip me. Just so you could differentiate between my crying and my laughing. And even the pain you gave me partook of sweetness.
40 That was my way. My only way to show how grateful I was for the things I had tasted before: your companionship; shelter and food in your big astana. So your parents said I would make a good servant, indeed. And you, too, thought I would.
41 Your parents sent you to a Mohammedan school when you were seven. I was not sent to study with you, but it made no difference to me. For after all, was not my work carrying your red Koran on top of my head four times a day? And you were happy, because I could entertain you. Because someone could be a water-carrier for you. One of the requirements then was to carry water every time you showed up in your Mohammedan class. “Oh, why? Excuse the stammering of my harelip, but I really wished to know.” Your Goro, your Mohammedan teacher, looked deep into me as if to search my whole system. Stupid. Did I not know our hearts could easily grasp the subject matter, like the soft, incessant flow of water? Hearts, hearts. Not brains. But I just kept silent. After all, I was not there to ask impertinent questions. Shame, shame on my harelip asking such a question, I chided myself silently.
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42 That was how I played the part of an Epang-Epang, of a servant-escort to you.
And I became more spirited every day, trudging behind you. I was like a faithful, loving dog following its mistress with light steps and a singing heart. Because you, ahead of me, were something of an inspiration I could trail indefatigably, even to the ends of the world....
43 The dreary monotone of your Koran-chanting lasted three years. You were so slow, your Goro said. At times, she wanted to whip you. But did she not know you were the Datu’s daughter? Why, she would be flogged herself. But whipping an orphaned servant and clipping his split lips with two pieces of wood were evidently permissible. So, your Goro found me a convenient substitute for you.
How I groaned in pain under her lashings! But how your Goro laughed; the wooden clips failed to keep my harelip closed. They always slipped. And the class, too, roared with laughter—you leading.
44 But back there in your spacious astana, you were already being tutored for maidenhood. I was older than you by one Ramadan. I often wondered why you grew so fast, while I remained a lunatic dwarf. Maybe the poor care I received in early boyhood had much to do with my hampered growth. However, I was happy, in a way, that did not catch up with you. For I had a hunch you would not continue to avail yourself my help in certain intimate tasks—such as scrubbing your back when you took your bath—had I grown as fast as you.
45 There I was in my bed at night, alone, intoxicated with passions and emotions closely resembling those of a full-grown man’s. I thought of you secretly, unashamedly, lustfully: a full-grown Dayang-Dayang reclining in her bed at the farthest end of her inner apartment; breasts heaving softly like breeze-kissed waters; cheeks of the faintest red, brushing against a soft-pillow; eyes gazing dreamily into immensity—warm, searching, expressive; supple buttocks and pliant arms; soft ebony hair that rippled....
46 Dayang-Dayang, could you have forgiven a deformed orphan-servant had he gone mad, and lost respect and dread towards your Appah? Could you have pardoned his rabid temerity had he leapt out of his bed, rushed into your room, seized you in his arms, and tickled your face with his harelip? I should like to confess that for at least a moment, yearning, starved, athirst... no, no, I cannot say it. We were of such contrasting patterns. Even the lovely way you looked— the big astana where you lived—the blood you had... Not even the fingers of
Allah perhaps could weave our fabrics into equality. I had to content myself with the privilege of gazing frequently at your peerless loveliness. An ugly servant must not go beyond his little border.
47 But things did not remain as they were. A young Datu from Bonbon came back to ask for your hand. Your Appah was only too glad to welcome him. There was nothing better, he said, than marriage between two people of the same blue blood. Besides, he was growing old. He had no son to take his place some day.
Well, the young Datu was certainly fit to take in due time the royal torch your
Appah had been carrying for years. But I—I felt differently, of course. I wanted...
No, I could not have a hand in your marital arrangements. What was I, after all?
48 Certainly your Appah was right. The young Datu was handsome. And rich, too.
He had a large tract of land planted with fruit trees, coconut trees, and abaca
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plants. And you were glad, too. Not because he was rich—for you were rich yourself. I thought I knew why: the young Datu could rub your soft back better than I whenever you took your bath. His hands were not as callused as mine...
However, I did not talk to you about it. Of course.
49 Your Appah ordered his subjects to build two additional wings to your astana.
Your astana was already big, but it had to be enlarged as hundreds of people would be coming to witness your royal wedding.
50 The people sweated profusely. There was a great deal of hammering, cutting, and lifting as they set up posts. Plenty of eating and jabbering. And chewing of betel nuts and native seasoned tobacco. And emitting of red saliva afterwards. In just one day, the additional wings were finished.
51 Then came your big wedding. People had crowded your astana early in the day to help in the religious slaughtering of cows and goats. To aid, too, in the voracious consumption of your wedding feast. Some more people came as evening drew near. Those who could not be accommodated upstairs had to stay below.
52 Torches fashioned out of dried coconut leaves blazed in the night. Half-clad natives kindled them over the cooking fire. Some pounded rice for cakes. And their brown glossy bodies sweated profusely.
53 Out in the astana yard, the young Datu’s subjects danced in great circles. Village swains danced with grace, now swaying sensuously their shapely hips, now twisting their pliant arms. Their feet moved deftly and almost imperceptibly.
54 Male dancers would crouch low, with a wooden spear, a kris, or a barong in one hand, and a wooden shield in the other. They stimulated bloody warfare by dashing through the circle of other dancers and clashing against each other.
Native flutes, drums, gabangs, agongs, and kulintangs contributed much to the musical gaiety of the night. Dance. Sing in delight. Music. Noise. Laughter. Music swelled out into the world like a heart full of blood, vibrant, palpitating. But it was my heart that swelled with pain. The people would cheer: “Long live the Dayang-
Dayang and the Datu, MURAMURAAN!” at every intermission. And I would cheer, too—mechanically, before I knew. I would be missing you so....
55 People rushed and elbowed their way up into your astana as the young Datu was led to you. Being small, I succeeded in squeezing in near enough to catch a full view of you. You, Dayang-Dayang. Your moon-shaped face was meticulously powdered with pulverized rice. Your hair was skewered up toweringly at the center of your head, and studded with glittering gold hair-pins. Your tight, gleaming black dress was covered with a flimsy mantle of the faintest conceivable pink. Gold buttons embellished your wedding garments. You sat rigidly on a mattress, with native, embroidered pillows piled carefully at the back. Candlelight mellowed your face so beautifully you were like a goddess perceived in dreams.
You looked steadily down.
56 The moment arrived. The turbaned pandita, talking in a voice of silk, led the young Datu to you, while maidens kept chanting songs from behind. The pandita grasped the Datu’s forefinger, and made it touch thrice the space between your eyebrows. And every time that was done, my breast heaved and my lips worked.
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57 Remember? You were about to cry, Dayang-Dayang. For, as the people said, you would soon be separated from your parents. Your husband would soon take you to Bonbon, and you would live there like a countrywoman. But as you unexpectedly caught a glimpse of me, you smiled once, a little. And I knew why: my harelip amused you again. I smiled back at you, and withdrew at once. I withdrew at once because I could not bear further seeing you sitting beside the young Datu, and knowing fully well that I who had sweated, labored, and served you like a dog... No, no, shame on me to think of all that at all. For was it not but a servant’s duty?
58 But I escaped that night, pretty Blue Blood. Where to? Anywhere. That was exactly seven years ago. And those years did wonderful things for me. I am no longer a lunatic dwarf, although my harelip remains as it has always been.
59 Too, I had amassed a little fortune after years of sweating. I could have taken two or three wives, but I had not yet found anyone resembling you, lovely Blue
Blood. So, single I remained.
60 And Allah’s Wheel of Time kept on turning, kept on turning. And lo, one day your husband was transported to San Ramon Penal Farm, Zamboanga. He had raised his hand against the Christian government. He has wished to establish his own government. He wanted to show his petty power by refusing to pay land taxes, on the ground that the lands he had were by legitimate inheritance his own absolutely. He did not understand that the little amount he should have given in the form of taxes would be utilized to protect him and his people from swindlers.
He did not discern that he was in fact a part of the Christian government himself.
Consequently, his subjects lost their lives fighting for a wrong cause. Your Appah, too, was drawn into the mess and perished with the others. His possessions were confiscated. And you Amboh died of a broken heart. Your husband, to save his life, had to surrender. His lands, too, were confiscated. Only a little portion was left for you to cultivate and live on.
61 And remember? I went one day to Bonbon on business. And I saw you on your bit of land with your children. At first, I could not believe it was you. Then you looked long and deep into me. Soon the familiar eyes of Blue Blood of years ago arrested the faculties of the erstwhile servant. And you could not believe your eyes either. You could not recognize me at once. But when you saw my harelip smiling at you, rather hesitantly, you knew me at least. And I was so glad you did.
62 “Oh, Jafaar,” you gasped, dropping your janap, your primitive trowel, instinctively. And you thought I was no longer living, you said. Curse, curse. It was still your frank, outspoken way. It was like you were able to jest even when sorrow was on the verge of removing the last vestiges of your loveliness. You could somehow conceal your pain and grief beneath banter and laughter. And I was glad of that, too.
63 Well, I was about to tell you that the Jafaar you saw now was a very different—a much-improved—Jafaar. Indeed. But instead: “Oh, Dayang-Dayang,” I mumbled, distressed to have seen you working. You who had been reared in ease and luxury. However, I tried very much not to show traces of understanding your deplorable situation.
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64 One of your sons came running and asked who I was. Well, I was, I was....
65 “Your old servant,” I said promptly. Your son said oh, and kept quiet, returning at last to resume his work. Work, work, Eting. Work, son. Bundle the firewood and take it to the kitchen. Don’t mind your old servant. He won’t turn young again.
Poor little Datu, working so hard. Poor pretty Blue Blood, also working hard.
66 We kept strangely silent for a long time. And then: By the way, where was I living now? In Kanagi. My business here in Bonbon today? To see Panglima
Hussin about the cows he intended to sell, Dayang-Dayang. Cows? Was I a landsman already? Well, if the pretty Blue Blood could live like a countrywoman, why not a man like your old servant? You see, luck was against me in sea-roving activities, so I had to turn to buying and selling cattle. Oh, you said. And then you laughed. And I laughed with you. My laughter was dry. Or was it yours?
However, you asked what was the matter. Oh, nothing. Really, nothing serious.
But you see... And you seemed to understand as I stood there in front of you, leaning against a mango tree, doing nothing but stare and stare at you.
67 I observed that your present self was only the ragged reminder, the mere ghost, of the Blue Blood of the big astana. Your resources of vitality and loveliness and strength seemed to have drained out of your old arresting self, poured into the little farm you were working in. Of course I did not expect you to be as lovely as you had been. But you should have retained at least a fair portion of it—of the old days. Not blurred eyes encircled by dark rings; not dull, dry hair; not a sunburned complexion; not wrinkled, callous hands; not....
68 You seemed to understand more and more. Why was I looking at you like that?
Was it because I had not seen you for so long? Or was it something else? Oh,
Dayang-Dayang, was not the terrible change in you the old servant’s concern?
You suddenly turned your eyes away from me. You picked up your janap and began troubling the soft earth. It seemed you could not utter another word without breaking into tears. You turned your back toward me because you hated having me see you in tears.
69 And I tried to make out why: seeing me now revived old memories. Seeing me, talking with me, poking fun at me, was seeing, talking, and joking as in the old days at the vivacious astana. And you sobbed as I was thinking thus. I knew you sobbed, because your shoulders shook. But I tried to appear as though I was not aware of your controlled weeping. I hated myself for coming to you and making you cry....
70 “May I go now, Dayang-Dayang?” I said softly, trying hard to hold back my own tears. You did not say yes. And you did not say no, either. But the nodding of your head was enough to make me understand and go. Go where? Was there a place to go? Of course. There were many places to go to. Only seldom was there a place to which one would like to return.
71 But something transfixed me in my tracks after walking a mile or so. There was something of an impulse that strove to drive me back to you, making me forget
Panglima Hussin’s cattle. Every instinct told me it was right for me to go back to you and do something—perhaps beg you to remember your old Jafaar’s harelip, just so you could smile and be happy again. I wanted to rush back and wipe
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away the tears from your eyes with my headdress. I wanted to get fresh water and rinse your dry, ruffled hair, that it might be restored to flowing smoothness and glorious luster. I wanted to trim your fingernails, stroke your callused hand. I yearned to tell you that the land and the cattle I owned were all yours. And above all, I burned to whirl back to you and beg you and your children to come home with me. Although the simple house I lived in was not as big as your astana at Patikul, it would at least be a happy, temporary haven while you waited for your husband’s release.
72 That urge to go back to you, Dayang-Dayang, was strong. But I did not go back for a sudden qualm seized: I had no blue blood. I had only a harelip. Not even the fingers of Allah perhaps could weave us, even now, into equality.
(1941)
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Meet the Writer
IBRAHIM JUBAIRA is perhaps the best known of the older generation of English language-educated Muslim Filipino writers and one of the most prolific, with three volumes of short stories published and two more collections of unpublished material.
Born in 1920, Jubaira began writing in high school. He was editor of the Cresent
Review Magazine and the Zamboanga Collegian, as well as a columnist for the
Zamboanga City Inquirer and Muslim Times. His own education and social standing— he came from a family of minor royalty—put him on a path familiar in colonial history. Coming of age under the colonial American government, his Englishlanguage education led him to government service: first as a teacher in Zamboanga and later with the Department of Foreign Affairs, which took him to Sri Lanka (1969-
78) and Pakistan (1982-85). A number of his later stories were set outside the
Philippines. In 1970, Jubaira received the Presidential Medal of Merit in Literature from Ferdinand Marcos.
As a young man, he published frequently in The Free Press, a magazine which was established in 1907 and published until it was shut down by the Marcos government in the 1970s. Throughout the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, The Free Press was—to paraphrase literary historian Resil Mojares—a middle-class bible, carrying articles on culture and current affairs, as well as a steady supply of English-language shortstories. The Free Press actively sought contributions from unknown or lesser-known writers in the provinces outside Manila, and it came to serve as a venue for such young writers. To publish in The Free Press was to be given a national, Englishlanguage audience for subject matter about which the readership may not have been knowledgeable.
“Blue Blood of the Big Astana” was published in 1941, on the eve of World War II.
Philippine independence was not formalized until 1946, and the great migration of
Christian Filipinos to Mindanao did not get underway until the 1950s. But like many intellectuals and political leaders of his generation, Jubaira advocated an integrationist approach in the southern Philippines, believing that only a measure of accommodation with the “Christian state” could protect Muslims from unscrupulous newcomers. For a time in the 1950s he served on the ill-fated Commission on
National Integration.
Both as a writer and as a high-status Muslim with the benefit of a colonial education, his voice assumes a distance from the world he describes in “Blue Blood.” Jubaira’s curious use of the Anglo-English term “Mohammedan,” for example, is an important marker of his complicated “debt” to American schooling and sets him apart as one empowered and knowledgeable enough to convey the world of datus, astanas
(palaces), and “Mohammedans” to others.
Ibrahim Jubaira died in 2003. (http://kyotoreview.cseas.kyoto-
u.ac.jp/issue/issue4/article_341.html)
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1 Awiyao reached for the upper horizontal log which served as the edge of the headhigh threshold. Clinging to the log, he lifted himself with one bound that carried him across to the narrow door. He slid back the cover, stepped inside, then pushed the cover back in place. After some moments during which he seemed to wait, he talked to the listening darkness.
2 "I'm sorry this had to be done. I am really sorry. But neither of us can help it."
3 The sound of the gangsas beat through the walls of the dark house like muffled roars of falling waters. The woman who had moved with a start when the sliding door opened had been hearing the gangsas for she did not know how long. There was a sudden rush of fire in her. She gave no sign that she heard Awiyao, but continued to sit unmoving in the darkness.
4 But Awiyao knew that she heard him and his heart pitied her. He crawled on all fours to the middle of the room; he knew exactly where the stove was. With bare fingers he stirred the covered smoldering embers, and blew into the stove. When the coals began to glow, Awiyao put pieces of pine on them, then full round logs as his arms. The rooms brightened.
5 "Why don't you go out," he said, "and join the dancing women?" He felt a pang inside him, because what he said was really not the right thing to say and because the woman did not stir. "You should join the dancers," he said, "as if—as if nothing had happened." He looked at the woman huddled in a corner of the room, leaning against the wall. The stove fire played with strange moving shadows and lights upon her face. She was partly sullen, but her sullenness was not because of anger or hate.
6 "Go out—go out and dance. If you really don't hate me for this separation, go out and dance. One of the men will see you dance well; he will like your dancing, he will marry you. Who knows but that, with him, you will be luckier than you were with me."
7 "I don't want any man," she said sharply. "I don't want any other man."
8 He felt relieved that at least she talked: "You know very well that I won't want any other woman either. You know that, don't you? Lumnay, you know it, don't you?"
9 She did not answer him.
10 "You know it Lumnay, don't you?" he repeated.
11 "Yes, I know," she said weakly.
12 "It is not my fault," he said, feeling relieved. "You cannot blame me; I have been a good husband to you."
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13 "Neither can you blame me," she said. She seemed about to cry.
14 "No, you have been very good to me. You have been a good wife. I have nothing to say against you." He set some of the burning wood in place. "It's only that a man must have a child. Seven harvests is just too long to wait. Yes, we have waited too long. We should have another chance before it is too late for both of us."
15
16
This time the woman stirred, stretched her right leg out and bent her left leg in.
She wound the blanket more snugly around herself.
"You know that I have done my best," she said. "I have prayed to Kabunyan much. I have sacrificed many chickens in my prayers."
17 "Yes, I know."
18 "You remember how angry you were once when you came home from your work in the terrace because I butchered one of our pigs without your permission? I did it to appease Kabunyan, because, like you, I wanted to have a child. But what could I do?"
19 "Kabunyan does not see fit for us to have a child," he said. He stirred the fire.
The spark rose through the crackles of the flames. The smoke and soot went up the ceiling.
20 Lumnay looked down and unconsciously started to pull at the rattan that kept the split bamboo flooring in place. She tugged at the rattan flooring. Each time she did this the split bamboo went up and came down with a slight rattle. The gong of the dancers clamorously called in her care through the walls.
21 Awiyao went to the corner where Lumnay sat, paused before her, looked at her bronzed and sturdy face, then turned to where the jars of water stood piled one over the other. Awiyao took a coconut cup and dipped it in the top jar and drank.
Lumnay had filled the jars from the mountain creek early that evening.
22 "I came home," he said. "Because I did not find you among the dancers. Of course, I am not forcing you to come, if you don't want to join my wedding ceremony. I came to tell you that Madulimay, although I am marrying her, can never become as good as you are. She is not as strong in planting beans, not as fast in cleaning water jars, not as good keeping a house clean. You are one of the best wives in the whole village."
23 "That has not done me any good, has it?" She said. She looked at him lovingly.
She almost seemed to smile.
24 He put the coconut cup aside on the floor and came closer to her. He held her face between his hands and looked longingly at her beauty. But her eyes looked away. Never again would he hold her face. The next day she would not be his any more. She would go back to her parents. He let go of her face, and she bent to the floor again and looked at her fingers as they tugged softly at the split bamboo floor.
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25 "This house is yours," he said. "I built it for you. Make it your own, live in it as long as you wish. I will build another house for Madulimay."
26 "I have no need for a house," she said slowly. "I'll go to my own house. My parents are old. They will need help in the planting of the beans, in the pounding of the rice."
27 "I will give you the field that I dug out of the mountains during the first year of our marriage," he said. "You know I did it for you. You helped me to make it for the two of us."
28 "I have no use for any field," she said.
29 He looked at her, then turned away, and became silent. They were silent for a time.
30 "Go back to the dance," she said finally. "It is not right for you to be here. They will wonder where you are, and Madulimay will not feel good. Go back to the dance."
31 "I would feel better if you could come, and dance—for the last time. The gangsas are playing."
32 "You know that I cannot."
33 "Lumnay," he said tenderly. "Lumnay, if I did this it is because of my need for a child. You know that life is not worth living without a child. The man have mocked me behind my back. You know that."
34 "I know it," he said. "I will pray that Kabunyan will bless you and Madulimay."
35 She bit her lips now, then shook her head wildly, and sobbed.
36 She thought of the seven harvests that had passed, the high hopes they had in the beginning of their new life, the day he took her away from her parents across the roaring river, on the other side of the mountain, the trip up the trail which they had to climb, the steep canyon which they had to cross. The waters boiled in her mind in forms of white and jade and roaring silver; the waters tolled and growled, resounded in thunderous echoes through the walls of the stiff cliffs; they were far away now from somewhere on the tops of the other ranges, and they had looked carefully at the buttresses of rocks they had to step on—a slip would have meant death.
37 They both drank of the water then rested on the other bank before they made the final climb to the other side of the mountain.
38 She looked at his face with the fire playing upon his features—hard and strong, and kind. He had a sense of lightness in his way of saying things which often made her and the village people laugh. How proud she had been of his humor.
The muscles where taut and firm, bronze and compact in their hold upon his skull—how frank his bright eyes were. She looked at his body the carved out of the mountains five fields for her; his wide and supple torso heaved as if a slab of
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shining lumber were heaving; his arms and legs flowed down in fluent muscles— he was strong and for that she had lost him.
39 She flung herself upon his knees and clung to them. "Awiyao, Awiyao, my husband," she cried. "I did everything to have a child," she said passionately in a hoarse whisper. "Look at me," she cried. "Look at my body. Then it was full of promise. It could dance; it could work fast in the fields; it could climb the mountains fast. Even now it is firm, full. But, Awiyao, I am useless. I must die."
40 "It will not be right to die," he said, gathering her in his arms. Her whole warm naked naked breast quivered against his own; she clung now to his neck, and her hand lay upon his right shoulder; her hair flowed down in cascades of gleaming darkness.
41 "I don't care about the fields," she said. "I don't care about the house. I don't care for anything but you. I'll have no other man."
42 "Then you'll always be fruitless."
43 "I'll go back to my father, I'll die."
44 "Then you hate me," he said. "If you die it means you hate me. You do not want me to have a child. You do not want my name to live on in our tribe."
45 She was silent.
46 "If I do not try a second time," he explained, "it means I'll die. Nobody will get the fields I have carved out of the mountains; nobody will come after me."
47 "If you fail—if you fail this second time—" she said thoughtfully. The voice was a shudder. "No—no, I don't want you to fail."
48 "If I fail," he said, "I'll come back to you. Then both of us will die together. Both of us will vanish from the life of our tribe."
49 The gongs thundered through the walls of their house, sonorous and faraway.
50 "I'll keep my beads," she said. "Awiyao, let me keep my beads," she halfwhispered.
51 "You will keep the beads. They come from far-off times. My grandmother said they come from up North, from the slant-eyed people across the sea. You keep them, Lumnay. They are worth twenty fields."
52
53
"I'll keep them because they stand for the love you have for me," she said. "I love you. I love you and have nothing to give."
She took herself away from him, for a voice was calling out to him from outside.
"Awiyao! Awiyao! O Awiyao! They are looking for you at the dance!"
54 "I am not in hurry."
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55 "The elders will scold you. You had better go."
56 "Not until you tell me that it is all right with you."
57 "It is all right with me."
58 He clasped her hands. "I do this for the sake of the tribe," he said.
59 "I know," she said.
60 He went to the door.
61 "Awiyao!"
62 He stooped as if suddenly hit by a spear. In pain he turned to her. Her face was in agony. It pained him to leave. She had been wonderful to him. What was it that made a man wish for a child? What was it in life, in the work in the field, in the planting and harvest, in the silence of the night, in the communing with husband and wife, in the whole life of the tribe itself that made man wish for the laughter and speech of a child? Suppose he changed his mind? Why did the unwritten law demand, anyway, that a man, to be a man, must have a child to come after him? And if he was fruitless--but he loved Lumnay. It was like taking away of his life to leave her like this.
63 "Awiyao," she said, and her eyes seemed to smile in the light. "The beads!"
64 He turned back and walked to the farthest corner of their room, to the trunk where they kept their worldly possession---his battle-ax and his spear points, her betel nut box and her beads. He dug out from the darkness the beads which had been given to him by his grandmother to give to Lumnay on the beads on, and tied them in place. The white and jade and deep orange obsidians shone in the firelight. She suddenly clung to him, clung to his neck as if she would never let him go.
65 "Awiyao! Awiyao, it is hard!" She gasped, and she closed her eyes and buried her face in his neck.
66 The call for him from the outside repeated.
67 His grip loosened, and he hurried out into the night.
68 Lumnay sat for some time in the darkness. Then she went to the door and opened it. The moonlight struck her face; the moonlight spilled itself on the whole village.
69 She could hear the throbbing of the gangsas coming to her through the caverns of the other houses. She knew that all the houses were empty that the whole tribe was at the dance. Only she was absent. And yet was she not the best dancer of the village? Did she not have the most lightness and grace? Could she not, alone among all women, dance like a bird tripping for grains on the ground, beautifully timed to the beat of the gangsas? Did not the men praise her supple body, and the women envy the way she stretched her hands like the wings of the
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mountain eagle now and then as she danced? How long ago did she dance at her own wedding? Tonight, all the women who counted, who once danced in her honor, were dancing now in honor of another whose only claim was that perhaps she could give her
70 husband a child.
71 "It is not right. It is not right!" she cried. "How does she know? How can anybody know? It is not right," she said.
72 Suddenly she found courage. She would go to the dance. She would go to the chief of the village, to the elders, to tell them it was not right. Awiyao was hers; nobody could take him away from her. Let her be the first woman to complain, to denounce the unwritten rule that a man may take another woman. She would tell
Awiyao to come back to her. He surely would relent. Was not their love as strong as the river?
73 She made for the other side of the village where the dancing was. There was a flaming glow over the whole place; a great bonfire was burning. The gangsas clamored more loudly now, and it seemed they were calling to her. She was near at last. She could see the dancers clearly now. The man leaped lightly with their
gangsas as they circled the dancing women decked in feast garments and beads, tripping on the ground like graceful birds, following their men. Her heart warmed to the flaming call of the dance; strange heat in her blood welled up, and she started to run.
74 But the gleaming brightness of the bonfire commanded her to stop. Did anybody see her approach? She stopped. What if somebody had seen her coming? The flames of the bonfire leaped in countless sparks which spread and rose like yellow points and died out in the night. The blaze reached out to her like a spreading radiance. She did not have the courage to break into the wedding feast.
75 Lumnay walked away from the dancing ground, away from the village. She thought of the new clearing of beans which Awiyao and she had started to make only four moons before. She followed the trail above the village.
76 When she came to the mountain stream she crossed it carefully. Nobody held her hand, and the stream water was very cold. The trail went up again, and she was in the moonlight shadows among the trees and shrubs. Slowly she climbed the mountain.
77 When Lumnay reached the clearing, she could see from where she stood the blazing bonfire at the edge of the village, where the wedding was. She could hear the far-off clamor of the gongs, still rich in their sonorousness, echoing from mountain to mountain. The sound did not mock her; they seemed to call far to her, to speak to her in the language of unspeaking love. She felt the pull of their gratitude for her sacrifice. Her heartbeat began to sound to her like many
gangsas.
78 Lumnay thought of Awiyao as the Awiyao she had known long ago—a strong, muscular boy carrying his heavy loads of fuel logs down the mountains to his home. She had met him one day as she was on her way to fill her clay jars with water. He had stopped at the spring to drink and rest; and she had made him
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drink the cool mountain water from her coconut shell. After that it did not take him long to decide to throw his spear on the stairs of her father's house in token on his desire to marry her.
79 The mountain clearing was cold in the freezing moonlight. The wind began to stir the leaves of the bean plants. Lumnay looked for a big rock on which to sit down.
The bean plants now surrounded her, and she was lost among them.
80 A few more weeks, a few more months, a few more harvests---what did it matter? She would be holding the bean flowers, soft in the texture, silken almost, but moist where the dew got into them, silver to look at, silver on the light blue, blooming whiteness, when the morning comes. The stretching of the bean pods full length from the hearts of the wilting petals would go on.
81 Lumnay's fingers moved a long, long time among the growing bean pods.
(1951)
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Meet the Writer
AMADOR T. DAGUIO was born 8 January 1912 in Laoag, Ilocos Norte, but grew up in Lubuagan, Mountain Province, where his father, an officer in the Philippine
Constabulary, was assigned. He was class valedictorian in 1924 at the Lubuagan
Elementary School. Then he stayed with his uncle at Fort William McKinley to study at Rizal High School in Pasig. Those four years in high school were, according to
Daguio, the most critical in his life. «I spent them literally in poverty, extreme loneliness, and adolescent pains …In my loneliness, I began to compose verses in earnest.”8 He was in third year high when he broke into print in a national weekly,
The Sunday Tribune Magazine (11 July 1926), with a poem, “She Came to Me.” He was going to be valedictorian or salutatorian, but his teacher in “utter lack of justice
…put down my marks in history—my favorite subject. That just about broke my heart because then I would have had free tuition at the U.P.”
Thus out of school for the first semester in 1928, he earned his tuition (P60.00) by serving as houseboy, waiter, and caddy to officers at Fort McKinley. He enrolled for the second semester with only P2.50 left for books and other expenses. He commuted between the Fort and Padre Faura, Manila, walking about two kilometers from Paco station twice daily. He would eat his lunch alone on Dewey Blvd. and arrive at the Fort about 9 o’clock in the evening. This continued for three years. Then an uncle arrived from Honolulu who paid his tuition during his third year; before this, he worked Saturday and Sunday as printer’s devil at the U.P. and served as
Philippine Collegian reporter. During all this time, he learned the craft of writing from
Tom Inglis Moore, an Australian professor at U.P., and was especially grateful to
A.V.H. Hartendorp of Philippine Magazine. His stories and poems appeared in practically all the Manila papers.
One of ten honor graduates at U.P. in 1932, he returned to teach at his boyhood school in Lubuagan; in 1938, he taught at Zamboanga Normal School where he met his wife Estela. They transferred to Normal Leyte School in 1941 before the Second
World War. During the Japanese Occupation, he joined the resistance and wrote poems in secret, later collected as Bataan Harvest.1 0 He was a bosom-friend of another writer in the resistance, Manuel E. Arguilla.
In 1952, he obtained his M.A. in English at Stanford U. as a Fulbright scholar. His thesis was a study and translation of Hudhud hi Aliguyon (Ifugao Harvest Song). In
1954, he obtained his Law degree from Romualdez Law College in Leyte. Daguio was editor and public relations officer in various offices in government and the military.
He also taught for twenty-six years at the University of the East, U.P., and Philippine
Women’s University. In 1973, six years after his death, Daguio was conferred the
Republic Cultural Heritage Award. (http://www.ncca.gov.ph/about-culture-and- arts/articles-on-c-n-a/article.php?i=29&subcat=13)
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1
2
I LOVE YOU, MIKE.
‘Yun lang at hindi na siya nagsalita pang muli. Pigil-pigil ng umid niyang dila ang reaksyon ko sa kanyang sinabi.
3 I love you, Mike. Nagpaulit-ulit ang mga kataga sa aking diwa. Walang pagkukunwari, ngunit dama ang pait sa bawat salita. Natunaw na ang yelo sa baso ng serbesa, lumamig na ang sisig, namaalam na ang singer, pero wala pa ring umiimik sa aming dalawa.
4 Mag-aalas-tres na, uwi na tayo.
5 Miss, bill namin.
6 Hanggang sa marating naming ang apartment n’ya. Wala pa ring imikan. Kaya ako na ang nauna.
7 Tuloy ba ang lakad natin bukas sa Baguio, Benjie?
8 Oo, alas-kwatro ng hapon, sa Dagupan Terminal. Good night. Ingat ka.
9 Are you okay, Benjie?
10 Wala ni imik.
11 Are you sure you don’t want me to stay tonight?
12 Don’t worry, Mike. Okey lang ako.
13 Okey. Good night. I’ll call you up later.
14 Usapan na naming iyon kapag naghihiwalay sa daan. Kung sino man ang huling uuwi, kailangang tumawag pagdating para matiyak na safe itong nakarating sa bahay.
15 That was two years ago. Pero mga ateeee, bumigay na naman ako sa hiyaw ng aking puso. Di na ako nakapagsalita pagkatapos kong banggitin sa kanyang “I love you, Mike.” At ang balak ko talaga, habang panahon ko na siyang di kausapin, after that trying-hard-to-be-romantic evening. Diyos ko, ano ba naman ang aasahan ko kay Mike ano?
16 Noong una kaming magkita sa media party, di ko naman siya pinansin. Oo, guwapo si Mike at macho ang puwit, pero di ko talaga siya type. Kalabit nga ng kalabit sa akin itong si Joana. Kung napansin ko raw ang guwapong nkatayo doon sa isang sulok. Magpakilala raw kami. Magpatulong daw kami sa media projection n gaming mga services. I-invite raw naming sa office. Panay ang projection ng lukaluka. Pagtaasan ko nga ng kilay ang hitad! Sabi ko sa kanya, wala akong
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panahon at kung gusto niyang maglandi nung gabing iyon, siay na lang. Talaga naman pong makaraan ang tatlong masalimuot na love-hate relationship na tinalo pa yata ang love story nina Janice de Belen at Nora Aunor, sinarhan ko na ang puso ko sa mga lalako. Sa mga babae? Matagal nang nakasara. May kandado pa!
17 Aba, at mas guwapo pala sa malapitang ang Mike na ito. At ang boses! Natulig talaga nagn husto ang nagbibingibingihan kong puso. And after that meeting, one week agad kaming magkasama sa Zambales. Of course, siya ang nagprisinta. Di ako. At noon na nagsimula ang problema ko.
18 Imbyerna na ako noon kay Joana, noong magpunta kami sa Zambales para sa interview nitong si Mike. Aba, pumapel nang pumapel ang bruha. Daig pa ang
“Probe Team” sa pagtatanong ng kung anu-ano rito kay Mike. At ang Mike naman, napaka-accommodating, sagot nang sagot. Pagdating naming sa Pampanga, bigla nga akong nag-ayang tumigil para mag-soft drink. Kailangan ko na kasing manigarilyo mang mga oras na iyon. Tense na ako.
19 Gasgas na sa aking ang puna ng mga amiga kong baklita na ilusyon ko lang ang paghahanap ng meaningful na relationship. Sabi ko naman, tumanda man akong isang ilusyunadang bakla, maghihintay pa rin ako sa pagdating ng isang meaningful relationship sa aking buhay. Nanininwala yata akong pinagpala din ng
Diyos ang mga bakla!
20 MATARAY ITONG SI Benjie, mataray na bakla, ‘ika nga. Pero mabait. Habang lumalalim an gaming pagiging magkakilala, lalo ko naming naiintindihan kung bakit siya mataray.
21
22
Well, if you don’t respect me as a persond dahil bakla ako, mag-isa ka. I don’t care. ‘Yun ang usual defensive niay ‘pag may nanlalait sa kanyang macho.
I’ve been betrayed before, and I won’t let anybody else do the same thing to me again. Ever!
23 Ang taray, ano po? Pero hanggang ganyan lang naman ang taray nitong si Benjie.
Para bang babala niya sa sarili. Lalo na pag nai-involve siya sa isang lalaki.
Natatakot na kasi siyang magamit, ang gamitin ng ibang tao ang kanyang kabaklaan para sa sarili nilang kapakanan. May negative reactions agad siya ‘pag nagiging malapit at sweet sa kanya ang mga lalaki.
24 At halata ang galit niya sa mga taong nagte-take advantage sa mga taong vulnerable. Tulad noong nakikinig siay sa interview ko sa namamahala ng evacuation center sa isang eskuwelahan sa Zambales. Nikuwento kasi nito ang tungkol sa asawa ng isang government official na ayaw sumunod sa regulasyon ng center sa pamamahagi ng relief goods upang maiwasan ang gulo sa pagitan ng mga “kulot” at “unat” na pawing mga biktima ng pagsabog ng Pinatubo. Simple lang naman ang regulasyon: kailangang maayos ang pila ng mga kinatawan ng bawat pamilya upang kumuha ng relief goods. Ang gusto naman daw mganyari ng babaeng iyon, tatayo siay sa stage ng eskuwelahan at mula doon ay ipamamahagi niya ang mga relief goods, kung kanino man niya maiabot. Alam na raw ng maga namamahala ng center ang gustong mangyari ng babae: ang makunan siay ng
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litrato at video habang kunwa’y pinagkakaguluhan ng mga biktima—unat man o kulot. Nasunod ang gusto nung babae, ngunit ang mga unat lamang ang nagkagulo sa kanyang relief goods. Ayon sa namamahala ng center, nasanay na raw kasi ang mga kulot sa organisadong pagkuha ng mga relief goods. Pero nagreklamo rin sila nung bandang huli kung bakit hindi sila nakatanggap ng tulong. Iiling-iling na kinuha ni Benjie ang pangalan ng babaeng iyon.
25 Ire-report mo?
26 Hindi.
27 Susulatan mo?
28 Hindi.
29 Ano’ng gagawin mo?
30 Ipakukulam ko. Ang putang inang iyon. Anong akala iya sa sarili niya, Diyos?
Isulat mo iyon, ha. Para malaman ng lahat na hindi lahat ng nagbibigay ng tulong ay nais talagang tumulong.
31 Takot din siyang makipagrelasyon. At dir in siya nanlalalaki, ‘yun bang namimikap kung saan-saan. Bukod sa takot itong si Benjie na mgkaroon ng sakit at mabugbog, di rin niya gustong arrangement ang money for love. Gusto niya, true love at meaningful relationship.
32 ‘YUN DIN NAMAN ang hanap ko. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m straight, okay?
33 Si Carmi ang pinakahuling nagging syota ko. Sabi nila maganda. Sabagay, maganda naman talaga itong si Carmi. Sexy pa. Ewan ko nga lang dito kay Carmi kung bakit laging nagseserlos sa akin. Hanggang ngayon, di pa niya maintindihan ang nature ng trabaho ko, e dalawang taon na kaming magsyota. Kung magdemand sa akin, para bang gugunawin ng Diyos ang mundo kinabukasan. E, para sa akin, di rin ito ang ibig sabihin ng meaningful relationship. Ayoko nang binabantayan ang lahat ng kilos ko. Ayoko ng laging ini-interrogate. Ayaw ko ang pinamimili ako between my career at babae. Para sa akin, pareho itong bahagi ng future ko.
34 Last year, inisplitan ako ni Carmi. Di na raw niya ma-take. Gusto raw muna niyang mag-isip-isip tungkol sa aming relasyon. Gusto raw niyang magkaanak sa akin, pero di niya tiyak kung gusto niya akong pakasalan. Naguluhan din ako.
Parang gusto kong ayaw ko. Mahal ko si Carmi, and I’m sure of that. Pero kung tungkol sa pagpapakasal, out of the question ang usaping ‘yun. Una, di kayang buhayin ng sweldo ko ang pagbuo ng isang pamilya. Pangalawa, di ko alam kung ang pagpapakasal nga ay solusyon para matigil na ang pagdedemand sa akin ni
Carmi. At pangatlo, di rin sigurado itong si Carmi sa gusto niyang gawin.
Pumayag ako.
35 Almost one year din akong walang syota. Isinubsob ko ang sarili sa trabaho.
Pero, from time to time, nagkikita kami ni Carmi para magkumustahan. Well, every time na nagkikita kami ni Carmi para magkumustahan, bigla ko siyang
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mami-miss, kung kailan kaharap ko na. Siguro’y dala ng lungkot o ng libog. Kung anuman ang dahilan ng pagka-miss ko sa kanya ay di ko tiyak. Pinipigilan ko na lang ang sariling ipadama sa kanya ang nararamdaman ko, dahil sa tingin ko’y mas naging masaya siya mula nang isplitan niya ako. Nakakahiya naman yatang ako pa ang unang umamin na gusto ko ulit siyang balikan, e siya itong nakipagbreak sa akin.
36 Naipakilala ko si Carmi kay Benjie sa isa sa mga dates na iyon. At naikuwento ko na rin noon kay Benjie ang tungkol sa nakaraan namin ni Carmi.
37 Carmi, this is Benjie. Benjie, this is Carmi.
38 Hi.
39 Hello.
40 DAAAY. MAGANDA ANG Carmi. Mas maganda at mas sexy kaysa kay Carmi
Martin. Pinaghalong Nanette Medved at Dawn Zulueta ang beauty ng bruha. Ano?
At bakit naman ako mai-insecure, ‘no? May sariling ganda yata itong ditse mo. At isa pa, wa ko feel makipag-compete sa babae. Alam ko namang may naibibigay ang babae sa lalaki na di ko kaya. Pero manay. Mayroon din akong kayang ibigay sa lalaki na di kayang ibigay ng babae Kaya patas lang… kung may labanan mang magaganap. Pero maganda talaga ang bruha. Bagay na bagay sila ni Mike, e ang kulang na lang sa kanila ay isang fans club at buo na ang kanilang love team.
Nanghihinayang talaga ako sa kanilang dalawa. They’re such a beautiful couple.
Na-imagine ko agad ang kanilang magiging mga anak. The heirs to the thrones of
Hilda Koronel and Amalia Fuentes o kaya’y ni Christopher de Leon at Richard
Gomez. Noong una, medyo naaalangan ako kay Carmi. Para kasing nu’ng makita ko silang dalawa, ang pakiramdam ko, kalabisan na ako sa lunch date na pinagsaluhan namin. Di naman feeling of insecurity dahil ang gusto ko lang, makausap sila ng tanghaling iyon at baka sakaling maayos na ang kanilang relationship. Tingin ko naman dito ky Carmi, ganoon din. Parang may laging nakaharang na kutsilyo sa kanyang bibig ‘pag nagtatanong siya sa akin o kay
Mike. Di kaya siya na-insecure bigla sa beauty ko? Tingin n’yo?
41 NAGING MAGKAIBIGAN na nga kami ni Benjie. Kahit tapos na ang ginagawa kong article tungkol sa kanilang project, madalas pa rin kaming magkita. Nag-iinuman kami, nanonood ng sine, o kaya’y simpleng kain sa labas o pagbili ng tape sa record bar. Marami naman akong naging kaibigang lalaki, pero iba na ang naging pagkakaibigan namin ni Benjie. Noong una’y naalangan nga ako. Aba, e baka ‘ka ko mapaghinalaan din akong bakla kung isang bakla ang lagi kong kasama.
Sabagay, di naman kaagad mahahalatang bakla nga itong si Benjie.
42 Loveable naman si Benjie. Kahit may katarayan, mabait naman. Okey, okey, aaminin ko. Sa kanya ko unang naranasang magkaroon ng lakas ng loob na ihinga ang lahat ng nararamdaman ko. ‘Yun bang pouring out of emotions na walang kakaba-kabang sabihan kang bakla o mahina. At pagkaraan ay ang gaan-gaan ng pakiramdam mo. Sa barkada kasi, parang di nabibigyan ng pansin ‘yang mga emotions-emotions. Nakakasawa na rin ang competition. Pataasan ng ihi, patibayan ng sikmura sa mga problema sa buhay, patigasan ng titi. Kapag nag-
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iinuman kami (at dito lang kami madalas magkasama-sama ng barkada), babae at trabaho ang pulutan namin. Sino ang pinakamahusay mambola ng babae, sino sa mga waitress sa katapat na beerhouse ng opisina ang nadala na sa motel, sino ang pinakahuling sumuka nu’ng nakaraang inuman? Well, paminsan-minsan, napapagusapan ang tungkol sa mga problemang emosyonal, pero lagi at lagi na lang nagpapaka-objective ang barkada. Kanya-kanyang pagsusuri ng problema at paghahanap ng immediate solutions bago pa man magpakalunod sa emotions.
Kaya hindi ako sanay ng nagsasabi kung ano ang nararamdaman ko. Ang tumbok agad, ano ang problema at ano ang solusyon. Pero, ‘yun nga, iba pala kapag nasusuri mo rin pati ang mga reactions mo sa isang problema, basta nase-share mo lang kung bakit ka masaya, kung bakit ka malungkot. Kay Benjie ko nga lang nasasabi nang buong-buo ang mga bagay na gusto kong gawin, ang mga frustrations ko, ang mga libog ko. Mahusay makinig itong si Benjie. Naipapakita niya sa akin ang mga bagay na di binibigyan ng pansin. Tulad ng pakikipagrelasyon ko kay Carmi. May karapatan naman daw mag-demand si
Carmi sa akin dahil siya ang kalahating bahagi ng relasyon. Baka daw kasi di ko pa nalalampasan ang nangyari sa akin nang iwan na lamang ako basta-basta nu’ng una kong syota kaya di ko mabigay ang lahat ng pagmamahal ko kay Carmi. Di lamang daw ako ang laging iintindihin. Unawain ko rin daw si Carmi.
43 DI BA TOTOO naman? Na baka mahal pa rin niya talaga si Carmi? Kahit ba magiisang taon na silang break, nagkikita pa rin naman sila paminsan-minsan. Ni hindi pa nga siya nakikipag-relasyon sa ibang babae after Carmi. Ito ngang si Joana, panay na ang dikit sa kanya ‘pag dinadaanan ako ni Mike sa office, di pa rin niya pansin. Babagay, di naman talaga niya matitipuhan si Joana. Not after Carmi.
44 So, noong una, sabi ko, wala namang masama kung magiging magkaibigan kami.
Nasa sa akin na ang problema kapag nahumaling na naman ako sa lalaki. Madalas kaming lumabas, lalo na after office hours at during weekends. Manonood ng sine, kakain, iimbitahan ko siya sa apartment for beer o kapag may niluto akong espesyal na ulam o kaya’y nag-prepare ako ng salad. Kapag umuwi ako sa Los
Baños para umuwi sa amin, sumasama siya minsan. Na-meet na nga niya ang mother ko. Nagpapalitan din kami ng tapes at siya ang natuturo sa akin ng mga bagong labas na computer programs.
45 So, okey lang. Pero unti-unti, di na lang tapes at salad o computer programs ang pinagsasaluhan namin. Aba, at may kadramahan din sa buhay itong si Mike. Ang dami pa raw niyang gustong gawin sa buhay na parang di niya kayang tuparin.
Gusto raw niyang makapagsulat ng libro, gusto raw niyang mag-aral muli, gusto raw niyang mag-abroad. Kung bakit daw kasi di pa niya matapus-tapos ang kanyang M.A. thesis para makakuha siya ng scholarship? Kung kuntento na raw ba ako sa buhay ko? Ang lahat ng iyon ay kayang-kaya kong sagutin para kahit papaano ay ma-challenge siya na gawin niya kung ano ‘yung gusto niya at kaya niyang gawin. Maliban na lang sa isang tanong na unti-unti ko nang kinatatakutang sagutin nang totoo: kung mahal pa raw kaya niya si Carmi?
46 MADALAS AKONG MAGLASING na siya ang kasama, pero ni minsan, di niya ako
“ginalaw” (to use the term). May mga pagkakataong tinutukso ko siya, pero di siya bumibigay. Tinanong ko nga minsan:
96

47 Don’t you find me attractive, Benjie?
48 At bakit?
49 Wala.
50 Wala rin naman akong lakas ng loob na sabihin sa kanya kung bakit. Baka siya masaktan, baka di niya maiintindihan, baka lumayo siya sa akin. Ayaw kong lumayo sa akin si Benjie.
51 Di rin naman perpekto itong si Benjie. Pero di ko rin alam kug ituturing kong kahinaan ang naganap sa amin minsan. Kung kasalanan man iyon, dapat sisihin din ako.
52 Nagkasunod-sunod noon ang mga disappointments ko. Di ko matapus-tapos ‘yung article na ginagawa ko tungkol sa open-pit mining sa Baguio dahil nagkasakit ako ng tatlong araw at naiwan ako ng grupong pumunta sa site para mag-research.
Na-virus ‘yung diskette ko ng sangkaterbang raw data ang naka-store. Nasigawan ako nu’ng office secretary na pinagbintangan kong nagdala ng virus sa aming mga computers. Na-biktima ng akyat-bahay ‘yung kapatid kong taga-Ermita. At tinawagan ako ni Carmi, nagpaalam dahil pupunta na raw siya sa States.
53 Ang dami kong nainom noon sa apartment ni Benjie. Nang nakahiga na kami, yumakap ako sa kanya, maghigpit. Bulong ako nang bulong sa kanyang tulungan niya ako. Kung ano ang gagawin ko. Pakiramdam ko kasi, wala akong silbi. Ni ang sarili kong mga relasyon ay di ko maayos. Alam kong nabigla si Benjie sa pagyakap ko sa kanya. Kahit nga ako’y nabigla sa bigla kong pagyakap sa kanya.
Pero parang sa pagyakap ko kay Benjie ay nakadama ako ng konting pahinga, ng konting kagaanan ng loob. Matagal bago niya ako sinuklian ng yakap. Na nang ginawa niya’y lalong nagpagaan sa pakiramdam ko. At natatandaan ko, hinalikan niya ako sa labi bago kami tuluyang nakatulog.
54 Ako ang hindi makatingin sa kanya nang diretso kinabukasan.
55 Sorry.
56 For what?
57 Kagabi, tinukso kita uli.
58 Nagpatukso naman ako, e.
59 Pero wala namang malisya sa akin iyon.
60 ‘Wag na nating pag-usapan.
61 Nakatulog ka ba?
62 Hindi.
63 Bakit?
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64 Binantayan kita.
65 Bakit?
66 Iyak ka ng iyak.
67 Oo nga. Para akong bakla.
68 Di porke bakla, iyakin.
69 Sorry.
70 Mag-almusal ka na. Di ka ba papasok?
71 Hindi muna. Labas na lang tayo.
72 Marami akong gagawin sa office. Di ako pwede.
73 Pwedeng dito na lang muna ako sa bahay mo?
74 Sure. Mamayang gabi na lang tayo lumabas.
75 Sige. Ikaw ang bahala.
76 Inaamin ko ulit. Kakaibang closeness ang nadama ko kay Benjie mula nung gabing iyon. Noong una’y idini-deny ko pa sa sarili ko. Pero sa loob-loob ko, bakit ko idi-deny? Anong masama kung maging close ako sa isang bakla? Kaibigan ko si Benjie, and it doesn’t matter kung anong klaseng tao siya. Sigurado naman ako sa sexuality ko. ‘Yun ngang mga kasama ko sa trabaho, okey lang sa kanila nang malaman nilang bakla pala si Benjie. Di sila makapaniwalang bakla si Benjie at may kaibigan akong bakla. E, super-macho ang mga iyon. Ingat lang daw ako.
Na ano? Baka raw mahawa ako. Never, sinabi ko pa. Hanggang kaibigan lang.
77 Si Benjie ang nahalata kong medyo lumayo sa akin. Dumalang ang paglabas namin. Lagi siyang busy sa trabaho. Laging nag a-out of town. Di ako nagkalakas ng loob na tanungin siya kung bakit. Baka ‘ka ko hinala ko lang na nilalayuan niya ako. Naging busy uli ako sa trabaho. Hinayaan ko na lang muna ang paglayo ni Benjie sa akin.
78 SINASABI KO NA NGA ba, walang patutunguhang maganda ang pagka-kaibigan namin nitong si Mike. Ayoko, ayoko, ayokong ma-in love. Di ko pa kayang masaktan muli. Ayokong sisihin niya ako sa bandang huli. Baka mawala ang respeto niya sa akin. Baka masira ang magandang pagkakaibigan namin. Pero,
Mike, di ako perpektong tao. May damdamin ako, may libog ako, marunong din akong umibig at masaktan. Ang drama, ateee. Pero ang mga ito ang gusto kong sabihin sa kanya nang gabing iyon. Gusto ko siayng tilian at sabihing: tigilan mo ako, kung gusto mo pang magkita tayo kinabukasan! Naloka talaga ako nang bigla na lang siyang yumakap sa akin. E, ano naman ang gagawin ko, ano?
Lungkot na lungkot na nga ‘yung tao, alangan namang ipagtabuyan ko pa. At para ano? Para lang manatili akong malinis sa kanyang paningin? Para lang mapatunayan sa kanyang ako ang baklang ipagduldulan man sa lalaking nasa
98

kalagayang tulad niya, sa gitna ng madilim na kuwartong kaming dalawa lang ang laman, ay di lang yakap at halik ang gusto kong isukli sa kanya nang gabing iyon.
At di rin kahalayan. Gusto ko siyang mahalin. Gusto kong ipadama ang nararamdaman ko para sa kanya. Isang gabi lang iyon. Marami pang gabi ang naghihintay sa amin. At di ako bato para di matukso. Higit sa lahat, bakla ako.
79 Take it easy, Benjie.
80 How can I take it easy, Mike, biglang-bigla ang pagkamatay ni Nanay. Ni hindi ko alam ngayon kung magsu-survive ako nang wala siya.
81 Kaya mo, matatag ka naman.
82 Not without Nanay. Napaka-dependent ko sa kanya. Alam mo ‘yan.
83 Nandito naman ako, Benjie.
84 Napatingin ako kay Mike. Oh, my hero! Sana nga’y totoo ang sinasabi mo. Sana nga’y nandito ka pa rin five or ten years after. Kahit di ko na iniinda ang pagkawala ng nanay. Sana nga’y nandiyan ka pa rin even after one year. Ewan ko lang, Mike. Di ko alam kung alam mo nga ang sinasabi mo.
85 Pampadagdag talaga sa mga dalahin ko itong si Mike. Sa halip na isipin ko na lang kung paano mabuhay nang wala ang nanay ko, iisipin ko pa ngayon kung paano mabuhay nang wala siya. Okay, okay, I admit it. Mahal ko nga si Mike. Pero sa sarili ko lang inaamin ito. Hanggang doon lang. Di ko kayang sabihin sa kanya nang harap-harapan. He’s not gay. Imposibleng mahalin din niya ako ng tulad ng pagmamahal ko sa kanya. Kaibigan ang turing niya sa akin. At alam ko na kung ano ang isasagot niya sa akin kapag ipinagtapat ko sa kanyang higit pa sa kaibigan ang pagmamahal ko sa kanya ngayon: that we are better off as friends. Masakit iyon, daaay. Masakit ang ma-reject. Lalo na’t nag-umpisa kayo bilang magkaibigan. Nasawi ka na sa pag-ibig, guilty ka pa dahil you have just betrayed a dear friend and destroyed a beautiful friendship.
86 Naalala ko ang Nanay. Di niya inabutan ang lalaking mamahalin ko at makakasama sa buhay. Sana raw ay matagpuan ko na “siya” agad, bago man lang siya mamatay. Noong una niyang makilala si Mike, tinanong niya ako kung si
Mike na raw ba? Ang sagot ko’y hindi ko alam.
87
88
NANDITO NAMAN AKO.
Tumingin sa akin si Benjie. Napatingin din ako sa kanya. Siguro’y kapwa kami nabigla sa sinabi ko. Nandito naman ako. Ano ba ang ibig sabihin nito? Well, nandito ako as your friend. I’ll take care of you. Di kita pababayaan. Ganyan ako sa kaibigan, Benjie. Pero sa sarili ko lang nasabi ang mga ito. Buong mgadamag nag-iiyak si Benjie sa kuwarto nang gabing iyon bago ilibing ang nanay niya.
Hinayaan ko siyang yumakap sa akin. Hinayaan ko siyang pagsusuntukin ang dibdib ko. Yakap, suntok, iyak. Hanggang sa makatulog sa dibdib ko. Noon ako naiyak.
99

89 Tahimik pa rin si Benjie hanggang sa matapos ang seminar na dinaluhan niya sa
Baguio. Habang sakay ng bus pauwi, noon lamang siya nagsalita.
90 Sorry sa mga sinabi ko kagabi sa bar, Mike.
91 Sabi ko na’t ‘yun pa rin ang iniisip mo.
92 Bakit, di mo ba naiisip ang ibig sabihin nu’ng mga sinabi ko sa ‘yo?
93 Inisip ko rin. So what’s wrong with that?
94 What’s wrong? Mike, umaasa ako sa imposible.
95 Di masamang umasa.
96 Kung may aasahan. At alam ko namang wala.
97 But don’t you think we are better off as friends?
98 (Sabi ko na. Sabi ko na!) But I’ve gone beyond my limits.
99 Alam mo naman ang ibig kong sabihin.
100 So what do you expect from me?
101 ANO BA TALAGA ang gustong palabasin nitong si Mike? Ni hindi nagalit. Di rin naman nagko-confirm na mahal din niya ako. Ay naku daaay, imbyerna na ako, ha! Ayoko ng mga guessing game na ganito. Pero mukhang masaya siya sa mga nangyayari sa buhay niya lately. Open pa rin siya sa akin at mukhang wala namang itinatago. Wala naman siyang resentment nang sabihin niya sa aking umalis na sa Pilipinas si Carmi.
102 Pero ako na naman ang naipit sa sitwasyon. Kung pagdedesisyunin ko siya, baka di ko makaya. Pero dalawa lang naman ang maaari niyang isagot: oo, mahal din niya ako bilang lover. Ang problema na lang ay kung matatanggap kong hanggang sa pagiging magkaibigan na lang talaga ang relasyon namin.
103 Ayain ko kaya siyang maki-share sa aking apartment? ‘Pag pumayag siya, di magkakaroon ako—at kami—ng pagkakataong palalimin ang aming relasyon. ‘Pag tumanggi siya, bahala na. Sanay na naman akong nag-iisa.
104 Tiningnan ko sandali si Mike at pagkaraan ay muli kong ibinalin sa may bintana ang aking tingin. Mabilis ang takbo ng bus sa North Diversion Road. Mayamaya lang ay nasa Maynila na kami. Sana, bago kami makarating ng Maynila, masabi ko sa kanya ang balak ko. Ano kaya ang isasagot ni Mike?
105 DI NA SIYA uli nagsalita. Pero, habang nagbibiyahe kami ay marami na uli akong naikuwento sa kanya. Nai-enroll ko na uli ‘yung M.A. thesis ko at papasok na uli ako this semester. Tinanong ko siya kung pwede niya akong tulungan sa research
100

dahil ‘yung thesis ko rin ang balak kong pag-umpisahan ng isusulat kong libro.
Ikinuwento ko ring umalis na si Carmi at kasama ako sa mga naghatid. Tumawag nga rin daw sa kanya at ibinigay ang address sa States para raw sulatan niya.
Tinanong ko kung susulatan niya. Kung may time raw siya.
106 Inaya niya akong umuwi sa Los Baños para dalawin ang puntod ng nanay niya.
Sabi ko’y sure this coming weekend.
107 ‘Yung tungkol doon sa sinabi niya sa akin noong isang gabi, pinag-iisipan ko naman talaga nang malalim. Di ako na-offend pero di rin naman ako sure kung gusto ko nga ulit marinig sa kanyang mahal niya ako. Natatakot akong magbigay ng anumang reaksyon sa kanya. Baka ma-misinterpret niya ako. Ayokong magaway kami dahil sa nararamdaman niya sa akin at nararamdam ko sa kanya. One thing is sure, though. Ayokong mawala si Benjie sa akin. Napakahalaga niya sa akin para mawala.
108 Ang balak ko’y ganito: tatanungin ko siya kung puwede akong maki-share sa kanyang apartment. ‘Pag pumayag siya, di mas mapag-aaralan ko kung ano talaga ang gusto ko—at namin—na mangyari sa aming relasyon. Kung gusto ko siyang makasama nang matagalan. Kung mahal ko rin siya. Kapag hindi, we’ll still be friends.
109 Mabilis ang takbo ng bus sa North Diversion Road. Nakatingin sa labas ng bintana si Benjie. Alam kong nahihirapan siya. Kinuha ko ang palad niya at pinisil ko ito.
Kung bakla rin ako? Hindi ako sigurado. But, does it matter?
(1991)
101

LUIS:
Kining akong paghigugma
Sa bukog, Inday, mikagit
Kong hinog ka pa lang sab-a
Lamyon ko hangtod ang panit.
PINAY:
Dili ako, Luis, motu-o
Nianang imong mga sulti
Pila na kaha ka babaye
Ang imo nianang gitunto?
LUIS:
Kining akong pagtindog
Ako na nga ginatukib
Ingon sa balay gitukod
Giuna ko ang paglatid.
PINAY:
Ang imong mga tuyo
Daan ko nang hingsayran
Wala pa gani ikaw manghangyo
Ako na ikaw gibalibaran.
LUIS:
Human ko na baya latiri
Gikutkot ko na ang yuta
Gipatindog ko na ang haligi
Gisunod ko ang mga damba.
PINAY:
Ako na kanimong gisulti
Nga dili na ikaw magbudlay
Ibta kanang imong haligi
Kay dili gayod ako muangay.
LUIS:
Ako inday ang nagabalay
Usa ra ang akong haligi
Pagbutang sa abay-abay
Gidungan ko ang kaballete
Pagbutang sa kaballete
Dungan ang mga pagbo
Maoy lig-ong espiki
Ang tagkos ug mga tarugo.
102
LUIS:
This love of mine,
Inday, bites to the bone
If you were a ripe banana
I’d swallow you skin and all.
PINAY:
I won’t believe, Luis,
A single word you say
I truly wonder how many girls
You have deceived this way.
LUIS:
Even as I stand here
My plans I have prepared
As in the building of a house
The design’s already made.
PINAY:
Your intentions
For sometime I have known
Before you will even ask
A ‘No’ is what you’ll get.
LUIS:
I’ve laid out my designs
And have dug up the ground
The post has been erected
The scaffolds are all set.
PINAY:
I have warned you
Your toil will go to waste
Pull out that post
For this will never go far with me.
LUIS:
Inday, I have built a house
With but a single post
Upon this post I’ve fixed the braces
The eaves and trusses of the roof
Held by spikes so strong
And dowels straight.

PINAY:
Ako gani magsulti
Wala ing balikbalik
Kanang imong haligi
Kaanugon lamang kausik
Kaballete ug mga pagbo
Kon muabot na ang bagyo
Walay manghisalin
Lulugtion tanan sa hangin.
LUIS:
Kutob ko ikaw makita
Sa usa ka pagpamilok
Ingon ako sa gipahigda
Sa maidlot nga mga tunok.
PINAY:
Kutob ko usab ikaw makita
Dako kong paghitingala
Anaa pa gani ang gatas sa baba
Namulong kana bahin sa gugma.
LUIS:
Sa gamay ka pang bata
Daan ko na ikawng ginapalandong
Karon ikaw nga dako na
Dili ba ako Inday makasilong?
PINAY:
Sa gamay pa akong bata
Daan ko na nga gipamulong
Nga kong ako madako na
Sa sulti dili ako palimbong.
LUIS:
Kanang sudlay mong sisik
Sa buhok nagatugabong
Ingon sa gugmang naglabtik
Sa dughan nagapanghagbong.
PINAY:
Kining sudlay kong sisik
Timaan kini sa katarong
Nga sa sulting palabtik
Dili kini palimbong.
LUIS:
Unsay bulong sa mingaw
Sa paglakat walay makuha
Gitinguha ko sa adlaw-adlaw
Ang pagpaagay sa mga luha?
103
PINAY:
I do declare without repeating
Your post a waste will be
Your trusses and rafters
Will with the strong winds go
No traces remain
For broken to bits they’ll be.
LUIS:
Each time I see you
In a wink, I feel as if I were
Laid out upon a bed
Of thorns so bare.
PINAY:
Each time I see your person, too,
My wonder’s great
How such a one with milky mouth
Can speak of love like some crude lout.
LUIS:
When still a child you wer
I nurtured thought of you, I swear,
Now that you’ve grown
Won’t you, Inday, allow me room?
PINAY:
Since I was a child so small
To myself I’ve said
When grown-up I’ll be
Words shall not deceive me.
LUIS:
That comb of tortoise shell
Atop the bundle of your hair
Is as love that taunts me still
And makes my breast throb with thrill.
PINAY:
This comb of tortoise
Stands for righteousness
That words that tease
Will not see me teased.
LUIS:
What’s the cure for loneliness
When all toil comes to naught
From day to day
Is it to drench myself with tears?

PINAY:
Adunay tambal sa mingaw
Mao ang humay ug saging
Ayaw katulog maadlaw
Pagdaro ug pagkaingin.
**********
LUIS:
Lipaya ang akong kamingaw
Utang kong buot kanimo
Baslan ko ikaw sa ulahing adlaw
Kay ako magasilbi kanimo.
PINAY:
Dili ako mao ang makaglipay
Nianang imong mga kamingaw
Pamiling sa laing Inday
Nga sa tinguha mo makatagbaw.
LUIS:
Ay, gipanilungan ko man gani
Ang kahoy nga walay dahon
Ikaw pa ba kaha ang dili
Gitan-aw ko nga may makaon?
PINAY:
Ako Luis ingon sa lagtang
Nga imo karon gipanilungan
Dili makatambal sa gutom
Kay makalanag pagakaunon.
LUIS:
Maayo ikaw, Inday, kay lipay
Ako tugob sa mga kasakit
Ingon ako sa ginabitay
Sa tungatunga sa mga langit.
PINAY:
Ang kalipay atua sa langit
Wala na dinhi sa Kalibutan
Ang sa yuta pulos kasakit
Wala nay sarang kalipayan.
LUIS:
Inday, ang imong pagdili
Daan ko na nga nasabut
Kong duna pa akoy bahandi
Tingali ikaw mubuot.
PINAY:
There is a balm for loneliness
Rice and bananas
Don’t sleep by day
Go plow the land, your swidden plant.
**********
LUIS:
Assuage this loneliness
A debt of gratitude
At some future time I’ll pay
When your slave I’ll be.
PINAY:
It’s not for me to grant that joy
Your loneliness dispel
Go seek another Inday
Your wishes can fulfill.
LUIS:
Ay, I even seek the shade
Of a tree without leaves
Why not then the shade of you
Seeing the bounty that you show?
PINAY:
Luis, I am like the lagtang
In whose shade you wish to stay
Its fruits can’t cure your hunger
For eaten, they’ll only sicken.
LUIS:
Good for you, Inday, for you’re so gay
Even as my poor self wallows in misery
I feel like I were suspended
In limbo, I suffered.
PINAY:
Happiness is in heaven found
Not in this world abound
For the earth is filled with sadness
And not with happiness.
LUIS:
Inday, your refusal
I have long sensed
Perhaps had I some treasure
Maybe you would relent.
104

PINAY:
Ako nganing gidili
Ang anak sa mga Hari
Ikaw pa ba ang dili
Gitan-aw ko walay bahandi?
LUIS:
Kanang imong kagahi
Gidutlan sa dakong kahumok
Gani ang lubas tabigi
Gilagbasan sa isdang tamilok.
PINAY:
Antusa ang imong palad
Ayaw kasakit sa pamalibad
Kay bisan unsaon sa pagpaagi
Palad ko gayud nagamasuki.
LUIS:
Ikaw ba ang kahoy nga miyapi
Nga miturok sa luyong tampi
Pagbantay kay hikankanan ka
Ning tubig nga nagaagi.
PINAY:
Kini, Iti, nga kahuya
Dili madali pagkatumba
Kay wala pa gani ang hangin
Nasuko na nanuwaysuway.
LUIS:
Bisan adto ka sa langit
Kaanyag nga walay sanglit
Kong ako ang magasangpit
Mukanaog ka gayod sa pilit.
PINAY:
Kong akoy adto sa langit
Lalake ka nga lumayan
Ayaw pagbudlay pagsangpit
Kay sa linti ko ikaw pakanaugan.
LUIS:
Pusta ako, Inday, limisa
Sa binukalan mong kandungga
Kong si Nanay mo mangutana
Ingna pinili nga bunga.
**********
PINAY:
I have even refused
The sons of kings
Surely, I’d do the same
To you who have nothing.
LUIS:
Your hard veneer
To the soft will yield
Even the hardwood, Teak,
To the shipworm breaks.
PINAY:
Bear your destiny
And be not pained by ‘nay’
For no matter what means you conjure
My fate runs counter to yours.
LUIS:
Are you that tree, the Miyapi,
That by the delta grows
Take care, eroded you shall be
By moving water as it flows.
PINAY:
This is one tree, Iti,
That falls not too easily
For even before the winds blow
It braces itself and fury shows.
LUIS:
Even when you’re in heaven
Beauty without equal
When it is I who shall call
Descend you will.
PINAY:
If I to heaven go
O, Man with the love potion,
Bother not to call
For I shall send you lightning.
LUIS:
Wrap me up, Inday,
In your flower-printed skirt
And when your Nanay asks
Tell her it’s choice fruit.
**********
105

PINAY:
Kong ikaw, Luis, mangasawa
Si Tatay ug si Nanay maoy sultihi
Kay kinsa bay musaka sa kahoy
Nga sa punoan dili muagi?
LUIS:
Matuod ikaw mao ang bulak
Sa usa ka maambong nga kahoy
Dili ko muagi sa punoan
Kong dili hagdanan sa imong kalooy.
PINAY:
Kong buot ka, Luis, mangasawa
Atuay katunggan daruha
Dili ka gani makadaro
Si Inday dili maimo.
LUIS:
Kinsa bay imong hindunggan
Nga pagadarohon ang katonggan
Dili ba kita higaba-an
Kumbinto kana sa tambasakan?
PINAY:
Kong buot ka, Luis, mangasawa balay namo ayuha
Ang salog niya nga bahi
Alisdi sa pulos sapi.
LUIS:
Hulata sa dili madugay
Kay mudangat ako sa inyong balay
Ang salog ninyong bahi
Alisdan ko ug pisos kahati.
PINAY:
Kong buot ka, Luis, mangasawa
Atuay balay namo ayuha
Ayaw pag-atupi sa nipa
Atupi sa pulos tisa.
LUIS:
Unsaon mo, Inday, ang tisa
Halayo kadtong Manila
Maayo na lamang ang nipa
Kay ania ra sa atong yuta.
PINAY:
If you, Luis, wish to marry
Tell Tatay and Nanay
For whoever climbs a tree
Must pass along the trunk.
LUIS:
Truly you are the flower
Of a beautiful tree
I shall not pass along the trunk
Unless offered the stains of your mercy.
PINAY:
If you wish, Luis, to marry
There lies a swamp, plow it
If you can’t plow it
Then Inday you can’t have.
LUIS:
From whom have you heard
That a swamp maybe plowed
Won’t that be sacrilege
Since it’s the mudskipper’s convent?
PINAY:
If you wish, Luis, to marry
Go mend our house
Its floor is made of palm trunks
Change it all with money.
LUIS:
Wait, for in a short while
I’ll reach your house
Your flooring of palmwood
I’ll lay out with coins.
PINAY:
If you wish, Luis, to marry
Go mend our house
Don’t roof it with palm leaves
Cover it with clay tiles.
LUIS:
What, Inday, do you want with tiles
It’s a long way to Manila
To use palm leaves is better
For we have them right here.
106

PINAY:
Kong buot ka, Luis, mangasawa
Atuay balay namo ayuha
Ang atup niya anahaw
Alisdi sa pako ug langaw.
LUIS:
Magaunsa kita sa langaw
Madugay pagatigumon
Maayo na lamang ang anahaw
Kay ania ra sa atong libon.
PINAY:
Kong buot ka mangasawa
Atuay lasang daruha
Ang kabatu-an ug kabatangan
Imong pagahinlu-an.
LUIS:
Kanang tanan nga gisugo mo
Sa madali akong tumanon
Maoy mahimong daro ang baboy
Ang amo maoy magkupot sa liboy.
PINAY:
Kong buot ka, Luis, mangasawa
Atuay balay namo ayuha
Ayaw salugi sa anibong
Salugi sa pulos dagom.
LUIS:
Giunsa mo paghunahuna
Pagasalugan man nimo ug dagom
Kon duna na kitay mga bata
Dili ba mahatuyom?
**********
PINAY:
Ayaw, Iti, ikasakit
Kining pamalibad kong himpit
Dili pa kaha buot ang langit
Kitang duha magakadait.
LUIS:
Ang pamalibad mong himpit
Imo lamang kanang binu-utbuot
Sak-on ko ang mga langit
Kay adto ako makigsabot.
PINAY:
If you wish, Luis, to marry go mend our house
Its roof is of fan-shaped palms
Change it with wings of flies.
LUIS:
What can we do with flies
They’ll take so long to gather
To use the palms is better
From our groves they can be gathered.
PINAY:
If you want to marry
Go and plow the forest
Clear it of rocks
And rid it of debris.
LUIS:
All of your orders
I’ll carry out right now the pig shall be the plow
And to drive it, the monkey.
PINAY:
If you wish, Luis, to marry
Go and mend our house
Floor it not with fishtail palms
But of needles, the floors should be.
LUIS:
Whatever made you think
Of a floor of needles
When we shall have children
Won’t they only get pricked.
**********
PINAY:
Do not, Iti, be pained
By my complete refusal
It may not yet be heaven’s will
That the two of us be paired.
LUIS:
Your refusal so complete
Is only by your will
I’ll climb the heavens, dear,
And come to terms up there.
107

PINAY:
Ayaw, Luis, kahiubos
Sa pamalibad kong bug-os
Dili ta palad ug signos
Fortuna ta nagakabalios.
LUIS:
Unsaon ko sa pag-hiubos
Sa imo, Inday, nga pagpamalibad
Nga dugay ko na ikaw gigapos
Sa gugmang dili mabadbad.
PINAY:
Kasingkasing ko nga madasig
Tabangi ako sa pagpamalibad
Aniay lalaking buot mulupig
Kanako buot mubihag.
LUIS:
Bisan unsaon mo sa pagpamalibad
Niining gugma kong matuod
Dili na ikaw makabadbad
Kay maayo nga pagkalangbud.
PINAY:
Oh! Daw tubig kang matin-aw
Nga gibunyag ning kasingkasing
Niining dughang mamingaw
Nanaha ka ug nanalingsing.
LUIS:
Pagkamaayo sa imong gawi
Wala akoy takos ibalos
Ania ang kalag ko ug kinabuhi
Kanimo akong itapus.
PINAY:
Kong mga bayhon pa lamang
Dili ako kanimo mag apas
Ugaling kay kagawi-an
Iunong ko kanimo kalag ug lawas.
PINAY:
Don’t, Luis, be humiliated
By my sincere refusal
It’s just not our fate
Our fortunes are separate.
LUIS:
How can I be humiliated
Inday, by your refusal
When long have I tied you up
With love that can’t be unraveled.
PINAY:
Eager heart of mine
Help me to refuse
Here’s a man who would wind
And wants to captivate me.
LUIS:
No matter how much you refuse
My love that is so true
You cannot break the knot
That abut you is coiled tight.
PINAY:
Oh, you are the clear spring water
That has baptized this heart
In this lonely breast
You’ve grown shoots and saplings.
LUIS:
How admirable your traits are
I can’t thank you enough
My life and soul I give you
For all eternity.
PINAY:
Had you fine airs alone
I never would have bothered
But since your nature’s good
Body and soul I’ll share with you.
Translated by Erlinda K. Alburo
108

Ang dugo nga mitulo sa samad sa akon kasingkasing
Puwang tinta nga milama sa panit sa akong pagbati,
Ug dugayng’ mapapa bisan hugasan pa kini nimo
Sa imong laway
Ug pahiran pa kini
Sa imong palad.
Dugay miundang ang pagdugo sa maong samad
Bisa’g gisampongan ko kini og dahon sa paglaum,
Gihiktan og taas nga panapton sa panahon,
Ug human tambali sa mertayolet
Sa kalagot, gitabunan sa gapas
Ug plaster sa kalimot.
Karon, ang samad, kay samad man kini, sa iyaha ra misira,
Mikugan ug miuwat, apan ang kangutngot sa imong
Pagbudhi ug pagbiya kanako motumaw
Sa kabugnaw tunga-tunga sa kagabhion,
Ug walay sipyat nga motandog
Sa akong kabukogan.
109

Meet the Writer
HI-D PALAPAR is the Communications Officer of the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc. and teaches part-time at the University of San Carlos. Her Cebuano and English poems have been anthologized locally and nationally. She was a fellow to the
Faigao, U.P., Iyas, and Iligan workshops.
110

Aling pag-ibig pa ang hihigit kaya sa pagka dalisay at pagka dakila gaya ng pag-ibig sa tinubuang lupa? alin pag-ibig pa? wala na nga, wala.
Ulit-ulitin mang basahin ng isip at isa isahing talastasing pilit ang salita't buhay na limbag at titik ng isang katauhan ito'y namamasid.
Banal na pag ibig pag ikaw ang nukal sa tapat na puso ng sino't alin man imbit taong gubat maralita't mangmang naguiguing dakila at iguinagalang.
Pagpupuring lubos ang palaguing hangad sa bayan ng taong may dangal na ingat umawit tumula kumatha't sumulat kalakhan din nila'y isinisiwalat.
Walang mahalagang hindi inihandog ng mga pusong mahal sa Bayang nagkupkop dugo yaman dunong katiisa't pagod. buhay may abuting magkalagot lagot.
Bakit? Alin ito na sakdal ng laki na hinahandugan ng buong pag kasi na sa lalung mahal na kapangyayari at guinugugulan ng buhay na iwi.
Ay! Ito'y ang Inang Bayang tinubuan siya'y ina't tangi na kinamulatan ng kawiliwiling liwanag ng araw na nagbibigay init sa lunong katawan.
Sa kaniya'y utang ang unang pagtanggol ng simoy ng hanging nagbibigay lunas. sa inis na puso na sisingasingap sa balong malalim ng siphayo't hirap.
Kalakip din nito'y pag-ibig sa Bayan ang lahat ng lalung sa gunita'y mahal mula sa masaya't gasong kasangulan. hangang sa katawa'y mapa sa libingan.
111

Ang nanga ka panahun ng aliw ang inaasahang araw na darating ng pagkatimawa ng mga alipin liban pa sa bayan man tatanghalin?
At ang balang kahoy at ang balang sanga na parang niya't gubat na kaaya aya sukat ang makita't sasa ala ala ang inat ang guiliw lampas sa saya.
Tubig niyang malinaw na anaki'y bulog bukal sa batisang nagkalat sa bundok malambut na huni ng matuling ayos na naka a aliw sa pusong may lungkot.
Sa aba ng abang mawalay sa Bayan! gunita may laguing sakbibi ng lumbay walang alaala't inaasaw asaw kung di ang makita'y lupang tinubuan.
Kung ang bayang ito'y nasasa panganib at sia ay dapat na ipagtangkilik ang anak, asawa, magulang kapatid isang tawag nia'y tatalikdang pilit.
Datapwat kung ang bayan ng katagalugan ay nilalapastangan at niyuyurakan katuiran puri niya't kamahalan ng sama ng lilong ibang bayan.
Di-gaano kaya ang paghihinagpis ng pusong Tagalog sa puring nalait at alin kalooban na lalong tahimik ang di pupukawin sa panghihimagsik?
Saan magbubuhat ang paghihinay sa paghihigantit gumugol ng buhay kung wala ding iba na kasasadlakan kung di ang lugami sa kaalipinan?
Kung ang pagka-baon niya't pagka busabos sa lusak ng dayat tunay na pag ayop supil ang pang hampas tanikalang gapos at luha na lamang ang pina a agos
Sa kaniang anyo'y sino ang tutunghay na di-aakain sa gawang magdamdam pusong naglilipak sa pakasukaban na hindi gumagalang dugo at buhay.
112

Mangyari kaya na itoy malangap ng mga tagalog at hindi lumingap sa naghihingalong Inang na sa yapak na kasuklam-suklam sa Kastilang hamak.
Nasaan ang dangal ng mga tagalog nasaan ang dugung dapat na ibuhos? baya'y inaapi bakit di kumikilos? at natitilihang ito'y mapanood.
Hayo na nga kayo, kayong nanga-buhay sa pag-asang lubos na kaguinhawahan at walang tinamo kundi kapaitan kaya nat ibiguin ang naaabang bayan.
Kayong antayan na sa kapapasakit ng dakilang hangad sa batis ng dibdib muling pabalungit tunay na pag-ibig kusang ibulalas sa bayang piniit.
Kayong nalagasan ng bunga't bulaklak kahuy niaring buhay na nilantat sukat ng balabalakit makapal na hirap muling manariwa't sa baya'y lumiyag.
Kayong mga pusong kusang ng dagat at bagsik ng ganid na asal ngayon ay magbanguit baya'y itanghal aagawin sa kuko ng mga sukaban.
Kayong mga dukhang walang tanging kundi ang mabuhay sa dalita't hirap ampunin ang bayan kung nasa ay lunas pagkat ang guinhawa niya ay sa lahat.
Ipahandog-handog ang boong pag-ibig hanggang sa mga dugo'y ubusing itiguis kung sa pagtatangol buhay ay ito'y kapalaran at tunay na langit.
113

Meet the Writer
ANDRES BONIFACIO was born on November 30, 1863 to Santiago Bonifacio and
Catalina de Castro in Tondo in Manila, Philippines. He was a Filipino revolutionary hero who founded the Katipunan, a secret society devoted to fighting Spanish occupation of the Philippines. He was the first one to lay the groundwork for the
Philippine Republic.
Bonifacio’s early education started in the Guillermo Osmena School. But, unfortunately, his parents died when he was 14 years old. This forced him to quit studies and look after his younger brothers and sisters. He earned a living by selling paper fans and wooden canes in the streets.
He worked in Fleming and Company as a clerk and Fressell and Company as an agent. Bonifacio was interested in classic rationalism and read some great works of
Victor Hugo, Jose Rizal, and Eugene Sue. He had a deep interest in reading books on
French Revolution and acquired a good understanding of the socio-historical process.
This encouraged him to join the Liga Filipina. The Liga Filipina was organized in 1892 by Jose Rizal for the purpose of uniting the nationalist movement for reforms.
The arrest and banishment of Rizal made the Liga practically dead as an organization. Bonifacio continued the struggle and formed Katipunan in 1892. The
Katipunan derived its ideological principles from the French Revolution and provided a significant platform for freedom, equality and independence.
The society was discovered by the Spaniards on August 19, 1896. On August 23
1896, Bonifacio and his followers assembled at Balintawak and agreed to have an armed struggle against the Spaniards. The first battle took place on August 25, 1896 and this followed a reign of terror. Due to conflict, the rebels were split into two groups, Magdiwang and Magdalo in Cavite, Luzon. When Bonifacio tried to mediate, he attempts were rebuffed. Bonifacio’s acts and plans were termed as harmful for the unity and he was arrested and executed for “treason and sedition”. The execution was ordered by Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo, the elected president of the provisional revolutionary government. Bonifacio was executed on May 10, 1897 in the mountains of Maragondon, Cavite.
(http://www.historyking.com/Biography/Biography-Of-Andres-Bonifacio.html)
114

Because the earth demands it toll, his body falls with the simplicity of any other weight, the body half-doubled over, a little folded with the limp, oblique angles of the dead.
You would think a man so holy might be lighter, thin as he was, the very sky of a kingdom supporting his skin awash to hues of April overcasts and after-images of sunlight.
You would think that he might have even wafted down from his perch, unpinned by angels, and that the ground might receive him with all the hush of a day becoming evening.
As it is, another carpenter used a hammer
(sashed now to his waist), and with someone other, guides the scourged body down all iron mined out of its hands and feet.
We look on him whom we have pierced.
We claim him as he is, every inch of heaviness coming to hear upon our summoned selves, coming to rest in our arms and garments.
Here then, is our faith in gravity, for it brings a god among us, close as the air, limbs forked into all directions as lightning and here we are: we can touch him.
Language like the darkened afternoons recedes, yet gestures still embrace this foot that bleeds; and see now hoe the wound’s airy hollow has caught the world at its purest sorrow.
(1993)
115

Alang kanimo mao koy tinguha,
Ning kalibutan duhay silimbahon,
Didto sa Langit, siya si Bathala,
Dinhi sa Yuta, ang imong kaambong.
Dili mahimo nga ikaw hikalimtan,
Akong Bathala sinimba sat ago,
Kay kon wala ka sa sulod ning dughan,
Unsa pay ako, Inday, unsa pay ako?
Silaw sa bulan, tipik sa bitoon,
Nga nagpabilin ning yutang malaay,
Kon daw buot ka nga dili simbahon,
Iuli sa Langit ang imong panagway.
Vicente Ranudo, Hikalimtan (1906)
1 Talk of love and the “true-blue” Cebuano will recite to you passages from the poetry of Vicente Ranudo (1882-1930). And he will probably go on to say that here is the clearest distillation of “Visayan Love.”
2 Is there such thing as a “Visayan love,” and is this it – an emotion at once physical and metaphysical, delicious, self-conscious, steeped in the sweet melancholy of distances (and, one might add, the lyric juices of the love-struck poet)? Ranudo’s is a high note in the Cebuano language of love but it is not the only note.
3 One can cite other renderings from the early twentieth century, Ranudo’s time – as folksy, lewd, and irreverent as anything Max Surban and Yoyoy Villame can devise.
Take this poem by the late Raon Durano (as naughty a poet as he was a politician) entitled “Ang Akong Gugma Kanimo” (published in Bag-ong Kusog, 28 November
1924) and dedicated to a woman code-named: Flower, “tag-iya sa akong mga
damgo, sa akong kalipay”:
4 Busa kanimo hinalaran ug pinagga ko isaad,
Nga ako sa imong dughan kanunay maghalad;
Sanglit ikaw ang kalag sa akong kinabuhi,
Oh! Magpakamatay sa ibabaw sa imong kaputli.
5 Yet, the sentiment expressed in Ranudo’s poetry (and a host of other poems in the same vein) has fixed itself as the “quintessential” Visayan love – heightened, perfervid, self-absorbed, almost in love with itself.
6 “Visayan love” seems a vacuous and amorphous concept. Yet, the “anthropology of emotions” tells us that human sentiments are not a kind of universal keyboard that sounds the same across time and across cultures. The keys (like anger, shame, fear, grief or love) vary in tones and respond to different pressures. Cultural differences may be found in display rules (acquired conventions, norms or habits that dictate what emotion can be shown to whom and in which contexts), coping
116

devices (cognitive and behavioral attempts to deal with the emotion and its causes), and elicitors (stimuli that draw out the emotion). To trace all these elements will require more space than I have here. (It might bore you no end as well.) A few suggestive ideas, however, can be explored.
7 What is Visayan gugma? While we can speak of a more or less distinctive configuration of sentiment, we deal as well with something far from static. If emotion is socially and culturally constructed, then gugma is as dynamic as culture itself.
8 Take Ranudo once again. The dominant ethos of love in Ranudo and other
Cebuano romantic poets is less indigenous than nineteenth-century in character, already the product of many extraneous influences. Spanish influence saw the
“romanticizing” of love. This arose out of Christian solipsism and guilt, and the deepening (moral as well as mystical) of the distance between the lover and the beloved, in what was often a miming of the distance between the sinner and his
God. Love came to be clothed with the aura of impossibility. Changing conceptions of the self, individuation, heightened basis f introspection, and a whole array of moral strictures (particularly the repression of sexuality) – all these created
“romantic love.”
9 There is a social dimension as well. Increased social stratification, population mobility, and the elaboration of social conventions created situations whereby there were more “distances” for lovers to cross. The problem of social or class distance is particularly prominent in popular Cebuano stories and poems dealing with love, in which the lover usually pines for a woman “forbidden” or
“unreachable.” (Indeed, the man can be the “object,” but then most Cebuano authors were men.) The mystification of the object of love installed woman on a pedestal (where, deprived of agency, she mouldered).
10 Love takes on other romantic colorings. It is quarried as a special preserve of the poor and the disposed. In a kind of compensatory reflex, the poor mystified their condition by saying that the rich may have the gold, the poor man has “soul.”
Emotion was seen as the site of uncorrupted, pure, or honest “humanity” in contrast with the wealthy’s calculated materialism or civilization’s artificial rationality. In the same way that poverty was often idealized in popular literature, so too was feeling as a realm in which the powerless could claim superiority.
Woman became the locus for other meanings, a vehicle for repressed social desires. Her chastity – a dominant theme in vernacular letters – was deployed as a symbol, a kind of last redoubt for those who had been forced by social circumstance to surrender almost everything else.
11 The “romanticizing” of love came from a confluence of social and cultural factors.
Such factors created a vocabulary of desire that spawned a minor industry of love poems and popular pamphlets on the art of amoral and the billet-doux (mga sulat
sa gugma). The vocabulary has remained persuasive to this day.
12 It was not like always like this. Nor was Ranudo’s time exactly homogeneous.
(Ranudo himself is not innocent of a certain slyness.) There were folksy poets like those who composed the jocular balitao and composo verses that tapped the less pretentious side of Visayan love:
117

13 Kining akong paghigugma
Sa bukog, Inday, mikagit
Kong hinog ka pa lang sab-a
Lamyon ko hangtod ang panit.
14 In the main, however, Cebuano love poetry was taken over by a kind of male narcissism, the elf-advertising display of “fine sensibility.” Women themselves were not wholly innocent: they willingly imprisoned themselves, corsets and all, in this manufactured image of themselves.
15 Reconstructing desire is a tricky thing. One can discern it only through what traces remain – poems, songs, charms, recorded practices and rituals. Still, one judges that the early Visayans were less prone to mystify heterosexual love. Seventeenthcentury Jesuit chronicler Francisco Alcina speaks of Visayan males (often upon the instigation of women, he says) carrying women off to the woods, but to conjure the “caveman” image is not quite correct. There were precolonial sexual niceties and taboos as well as folk poetry that showed such emotion as Ranudo would have envied. If Alcina is to be believed, moderns cannot quite match the delicacies f communication the early Visayans were capable of. Speaking of Visayan music,
Alcina writes: “They gather and join together to look each other over, they make love to one another and court each other (using musical instruments like the
kudyapi) with much more feeling or sensuality than by word of mouth.”
16 Still, love was not yet imprisoned in such thickets of inhibitions as grew later on.
The missionaries were still somewhere else. “Christian guilt” had not yet been invented. Sex and the body were not an object of shame. Again, to quote Alcina:
“I believe that either in ancient times nor now is chastity esteemed among them, nor before did they recognize it as a virtue.” They appreciated the body. They endured labor and pain to make themselves physically attractive (as witness the ancient cosmetology of tattooing). They underwent “erotic surgery” and invented instruments (such as the “penis-wheel” – a device that modesty prevents us from describing in graphic detail) to enhance what an early chronicler called “the pleasures of Venus” (in contrast to other cultures where similar practices were designed to restrain or repress, rather than increase, sexual gratification).
17 What is further interesting is that in this field of unabashed sensuality, women
(practically all the early travelers and chroniclers attest) were more “sensual, vicious, and restless” than men. Australian scholar Anthony Reid argues that this illustrated the relative autonomy of Southeast Asian women: “Women took a very active part in courtship and lovemaking, and demanded as much as they gave by way of sexual and emotional gratification.” Women did not collapse in sighs, secretly wilting in unrequited love, they were active foragers for both sex and love.
18 This is a world away from the world of Ranudo. Love may be forever, but it does translate in many ways. Emotions are “a kind of language of the self – a code for statements about intentions, actions, and social relations.” They speak of something quite private, yet they speak as well of the public spaces we inhabit.
(1993)
118

Meet the Writer
RESIL B. MOJARES, trained in literature and anthropology, won several National
Book Awards from the Manila Critics Circle for works in fields of literary criticism, urban and rural history, and political biography.
He has been a recipient of prizes for his short stories, a national fellowships in the essay from the UP ICW, and teaching and research fellowships from the Ford, Toyota and Rockefeller foundations, Fulbright Program and Social Science Research Council
(New York).
He served as visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin, University of Hawaii and University of Michigan.
He was honored with a Gawad Balagtas award by the UMPIL in 1997 for his contributions to the development of Philippine literature. Dr. Mojares is Professor
Emeritus at the University of San Carlos, Cebu City.
(http://panitikan.com.ph/authors/m/rbmojares.htm)
119

(Lalaki)
Pangako ko’y tutuparin hanggang doon sa libingan
Ikaw lamang ang sa puso’y mamahalin nang lubusan
Pag-ibig ko’y walang kupas at wala ring katapusan
Manalig ka, aking mahal, ako’y tapat sa sumpaan
Kung sakaling may pagsubok na sa atin ay darating
Kumapit ka sa bisig ko’t ito’y aking haharapin
Tandaan mo, aking mahal, ako’y handang sagupain
Ang anumang kahirapang sa buhay ko’y susuungin
(Babae)
Pag-ibig ko’y iyong-iyo buong puso’t kaluluwa
Angkinin mo ang pagsuyong sa tuwina’y nadarama
Ang buo kong pagmamahal ay sa iyo lamang, sinta
Ngayon at kailanpaman ako’y hindi mag-iiba.
Karamay mo sa pagsalag maging anumang pagsubok
Kahati mo sa ligaya habang puso’y tumitibok
Sa dibdib ko’y ikaw lamang nag-iisang iniluklok
Kaya hanggang sa libingan tapat ako sa pag-irog
(Tadhana)
Madilim ang kalawakan, ang panahon ay masungit
Maalon ang karagatan, ang hangin ay nagagalit
Ang talampas ay matunog sa ragasa noong tubig
Madagundong yaong kulog, ang kidlat ay nanghahaplit
Matarik ang mga bundok, daraanan ay mabato
Madawag ang kagubatan, matinik ang bawat dako
Mahaba ang lalakbayin at nagkalat yaong tukso
Waring di na makakayang dagdagan ang sakripisyo
Unti-unti ay kumalas ang daop ng mga palad
Unti-unti ay lumuwag ang higpit ng mga yakap
Ang daigdig ay natulig sa matunog na halakhak
Pagkat muling nagtagumpay isinugo n’yang alagad
120

1 Through the open window the air-steeped outdoors passed into his room, quietly enveloping him, stealing into his very thought. Esperanza, Julia, the sorry mess he had made of life, the years to come even now beginning to weigh down, to crush--they lost concreteness, diffused into formless melancholy. The tranquil murmur of conversation issued from the brick-tiled azotea where Don Julian and
Carmen were busy puttering away among the rose pots.
2 "Papa, and when will the 'long table' be set?"
3 "I don't know yet. Alfredo is not very specific, but I understand Esperanza wants it to be next month."
4 Carmen sighed impatiently. "Why is he not a bit more decided, I wonder. He is over thirty, is he not? And still a bachelor! Esperanza must be tired waiting."
5 "She does not seem to be in much of a hurry either," Don Julian nasally commented, while his rose scissors busily snipped away.
6 "How can a woman be in a hurry when the man does not hurry her?" Carmen returned, pinching off a worm with a careful, somewhat absent air. "Papa, do you remember how much in love he was?"
7 "In love? With whom?"
8 "With Esperanza, of course. He has not had another love affair that I know of," she said with good-natured contempt. "What I mean is that at the beginning he was enthusiastic--flowers, serenades, notes, and things like that--"
9 Alfredo remembered that period with a wonder not unmixed with shame. That was less than four years ago. He could not understand those months of a great hunger that was not of the body nor yet of the mind, a craving that had seized on him one quiet night when the moon was abroad and under the dappled shadow of the trees in the plaza, man wooed maid. Was he being cheated by life? Love--he seemed to have missed it. Or was the love that others told about a mere fabrication of perfervid imagination, an exaggeration of the commonplace, a glorification of insipid monotonies such as made up his love life? Was love a combination of circumstances, or sheer native capacity of soul? In those days love was, for him, still the eternal puzzle; for love, as he knew it, was a stranger to love as he divined it might be.
10 Sitting quietly in his room now, he could almost revive the restlessness of those days, the feeling of tumultuous haste, such as he knew so well in his boyhood when something beautiful was going on somewhere and he was trying to get there in time to see. "Hurry, hurry, or you will miss it," someone had seemed to urge in his ears. So he had avidly seized on the shadow of Love and deluded himself for a long while in the way of humanity from time immemorial. In the meantime, he became very much engaged to Esperanza.
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11 Why would men so mismanage their lives? Greed, he thought, was what ruined so many. Greed--the desire to crowd into a moment all the enjoyment it will hold, to squeeze from the hour all the emotion it will yield. Men commit themselves when but half-meaning to do so, sacrificing possible future fullness of ecstasy to the craving for immediate excitement. Greed--mortgaging the future-forcing the hand of Time, or of Fate.
12 "What do you think happened?" asked Carmen, pursuing her thought.
13 "I supposed long-engaged people are like that; warm now, cool tomorrow. I think they are oftener cool than warm. The very fact that an engagement has been allowed to prolong itself argues a certain placidity of temperament--or of affection--on the part of either, or both." Don Julian loved to philosophize. He was talking now with an evident relish in words, his resonant, very nasal voice toned down to monologue pitch. "That phase you were speaking of is natural enough for a beginning. Besides, that, as I see it, was Alfredo's last race with escaping youth--"
14 Carmen laughed aloud at the thought of her brother's perfect physical repose-almost indolence--disturbed in the role suggested by her father's figurative language.
15 "A last spurt of hot blood," finished the old man.
16 Few certainly would credit Alfredo Salazar with hot blood. Even his friends had amusedly diagnosed his blood as cool and thin, citing incontrovertible evidence.
Tall and slender, he moved with an indolent ease that verged on grace. Under straight recalcitrant hair, a thin face with a satisfying breadth of forehead, slow, dreamer's eyes, and astonishing freshness of lips--indeed Alfredo Salazar's appearance betokened little of exuberant masculinity; rather a poet with wayward humor, a fastidious artist with keen, clear brain.
17 He rose and quietly went out of the house. He lingered a moment on the stone steps; then went down the path shaded by immature acacias, through the little tarred gate which he left swinging back and forth, now opening, now closing, on the gravel road bordered along the farther side by madre cacao hedge in tardy lavender bloom.
18 The gravel road narrowed as it slanted up to the house on the hill, whose wide, open porches he could glimpse through the heat-shrivelled tamarinds in the
Martinez yard.
19
20
Six weeks ago that house meant nothing to him save that it was the Martinez house, rented and occupied by Judge del Valle and his family. Six weeks ago Julia
Salas meant nothing to him; he did not even know her name; but now—
One evening he had gone "neighboring" with Don Julian; a rare enough occurrence, since he made it a point to avoid all appearance of currying favor with the Judge. This particular evening however, he had allowed himself to be persuaded. "A little mental relaxation now and then is beneficial," the old man had said. "Besides, a judge's good will, you know;" the rest of the thought—"is worth a rising young lawyer's trouble"—Don Julian conveyed through a shrug and
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a smile that derided his own worldly wisdom.
21 A young woman had met them at the door. It was evident from the excitement of the Judge's children that she was a recent and very welcome arrival. In the characteristic Filipino way formal introductions had been omitted--the judge limiting himself to a casual "Ah, ya se conocen?"--with the consequence that
Alfredo called her Miss del Valle throughout the evening.
22 He was puzzled that she should smile with evident delight every time he addressed her thus. Later Don Julian informed him that she was not the Judge's sister, as he had supposed, but his sister-in-law, and that her name was Julia
Salas. A very dignified rather austere name, he thought. Still, the young lady should have corrected him. As it was, he was greatly embarrassed, and felt that he should explain.
23 To his apology, she replied, "That is nothing, Each time I was about to correct you, but I remembered a similar experience I had once before."
24 "Oh," he drawled out, vastly relieved.
25 "A man named Manalang--I kept calling him Manalo. After the tenth time or so, the young man rose from his seat and said suddenly, 'Pardon me, but my name is Manalang, Manalang.' You know, I never forgave him!"
26 He laughed with her.
27 "The best thing to do under the circumstances, I have found out," she pursued,
"is to pretend not to hear, and to let the other person find out his mistake without help."
28 "As you did this time. Still, you looked amused every time I—"
29 "I was thinking of Mr. Manalang."
30 Don Julian and his uncommunicative friend, the Judge, were absorbed in a game of chess. The young man had tired of playing appreciative spectator and desultory conversationalist, so he and Julia Salas had gone off to chat in the vine-covered porch. The lone piano in the neighborhood alternately tinkled and banged away as the player's moods altered. He listened, and wondered irrelevantly if Miss Salas could sing; she had such a charming speaking voice.
31 He was mildly surprised to note from her appearance that she was unmistakably a sister of the Judge's wife, although Doña Adela was of a different type altogether. She was small and plump, with wide brown eyes, clearly defined eyebrows, and delicately modeled hips--a pretty woman with the complexion of a baby and the expression of a likable cow. Julia was taller, not so obviously pretty.
She had the same eyebrows and lips, but she was much darker, of a smooth rich brown with underlying tones of crimson which heightened the impression she gave of abounding vitality.
32 On Sunday mornings after mass, father and son would go crunching up the gravel road to the house on the hill. The Judge's wife invariably offered them
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beer, which Don Julian enjoyed and Alfredo did not. After a half hour or so, the chessboard would be brought out; then Alfredo and Julia Salas would go out to the porch to chat. She sat in the low hammock and he in a rocking chair and the hours—warm, quiet March hours—sped by. He enjoyed talking with her and it was evident that she liked his company; yet what feeling there was between them was so undisturbed that it seemed a matter of course. Only when
Esperanza chanced to ask him indirectly about those visits did some uneasiness creep into his thoughts of the girl next door.
33 Esperanza had wanted to know if he went straight home after mass. Alfredo suddenly realized that for several Sundays now he had not waited for Esperanza to come out of the church as he had been wont to do. He had been eager to go
"neighboring."
34 He answered that he went home to work. And, because he was not habitually untruthful, added, "Sometimes I go with Papa to Judge del Valle's."
35 She dropped the topic. Esperanza was not prone to indulge in unprovoked jealousies. She was a believer in the regenerative virtue of institutions, in their power to regulate feeling as well as conduct. If a man were married, why, of course, he loved his wife; if he were engaged, he could not possibly love another woman.
36
37
That half-lie told him what he had not admitted openly to himself, that he was giving Julia Salas something which he was not free to give. He realized that; yet something that would not be denied beckoned imperiously, and he followed on.
It was so easy to forget up there, away from the prying eyes of the world, so easy and so poignantly sweet. The beloved woman, he standing close to her, the shadows around, enfolding.
38 "Up here I find—something—"
39 He and Julia Salas stood looking out into the she quiet night. Sensing unwanted intensity, laughed, woman-like, asking, "Amusement?"
40 "No; youth—its spirit—"
41 "Are you so old?"
42 "And heart's desire."
43 Was he becoming a poet, or is there a poet lurking in the heart of every man?
44 "Down there," he had continued, his voice somewhat indistinct, "the road is too broad, too trodden by feet, too barren of mystery."
45 "Down there" beyond the ancient tamarinds lay the road, upturned to the stars.
In the darkness the fireflies glimmered, while an errant breeze strayed in from somewhere, bringing elusive, faraway sounds as of voices in a dream.
46 "Mystery—" she answered lightly, "that is so brief—"
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47 "Not in some," quickly. "Not in you."
48 "You have known me a few weeks; so the mystery."
49 "I could study you all my life and still not find it."
50 "So long?"
51 "I should like to."
52 Those six weeks were now so swift—seeming in the memory, yet had they been so deep in the living, so charged with compelling power and sweetness. Because neither the past nor the future had relevance or meaning, he lived only the present, day by day, lived it intensely, with such a willful shutting out of fact as astounded him in his calmer moments.
53 Just before Holy Week, Don Julian invited the judge and his family to spend
Sunday afternoon at Tanda where he had a coconut plantation and a house on the beach. Carmen also came with her four energetic children. She and Doña
Adela spent most of the time indoors directing the preparation of the merienda and discussing the likeable absurdities of their husbands--how Carmen's Vicente was so absorbed in his farms that he would not even take time off to accompany her on this visit to her father; how Doña Adela's Dionisio was the most absentminded of men, sometimes going out without his collar, or with unmatched socks.
54 After the merienda, Don Julian sauntered off with the judge to show him what a thriving young coconut looked like—"plenty of leaves, close set, rich green"— while the children, convoyed by Julia Salas, found unending entertainment in the rippling sand left by the ebbing tide. They were far down, walking at the edge of the water, indistinctly outlined against the gray of the out-curving beach.
55 Alfredo left his perch on the bamboo ladder of the house and followed. Here were
57 her footsteps, narrow, arched. He laughed at himself for his black canvas footwear which he removed forthwith and tossed high up on dry sand.
56 When he came up, she flushed, then smiled with frank pleasure.
"I hope you are enjoying this," he said with a questioning inflection.
58 "Very much. It looks like home to me, except that we do not have such a lovely beach."
59 There was a breeze from the water. It blew the hair away from her forehead, and whipped the tucked-up skirt around her straight, slender figure. In the picture was something of eager freedom as of wings poised in flight. The girl had grace, distinction. Her face was not notably pretty; yet she had a tantalizing charm, all the more compelling because it was an inner quality, an achievement of the spirit. The lure was there, of naturalness, of an alert vitality of mind and body, of a thoughtful, sunny temper, and of a piquant perverseness which is sauce to charm.
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60 "The afternoon has seemed very short, hasn't it?" Then, "This, I think, is the last time—we can visit."
61 "The last? Why?"
62 "Oh, you will be too busy perhaps."
63 He noted an evasive quality in the answer.
64 "Do I seem especially industrious to you?"
65 "If you are, you never look it."
66 "Not perspiring or breathless, as a busy man ought to be."
67 "But—"
68 "Always unhurried, too unhurried, and calm." She smiled to herself.
69 "I wish that were true," he said after a meditative pause.
70 She waited.
71 "A man is happier if he is, as you say, calm and placid."
72 "Like a carabao in a mud pool," she retorted perversely.
73 "Who? I?"
74 "Oh, no!"
75 "You said I am calm and placid."
76 "That is what I think."
77 "I used to think so too. Shows how little we know ourselves."
78 It was strange to him that he could be wooing thus: with tone and look and covert phrase.
79 "I should like to see your home town."
80 "There is nothing to see—little crooked streets, bunut roofs with ferns growing on them, and sometimes squashes."
81 That was the background. It made her seem less detached, less unrelated, yet withal more distant, as if that background claimed her and excluded him.
82 "Nothing? There is you."
83 "Oh, me? But I am here."
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84 "I will not go, of course, until you are there."
85 "Will you come? You will find it dull. There isn't even one American there!"
86 "Well--Americans are rather essential to my entertainment."
87 She laughed.
88 "We live on Calle Luz, a little street with trees."
89 "Could I find that?"
90 "If you don't ask for Miss del Valle," she smiled teasingly.
91 "I'll inquire about—"
92 "What?"
93 "The house of the prettiest girl in the town."
94 "There is where you will lose your way." Then she turned serious. "Now, that is not quite sincere."
95 "It is," he averred slowly, but emphatically.
96 "I thought you, at least, would not say such things."
97 "Pretty—pretty—a foolish word! But there is none other more handy I did not mean that quite—"
98 "Are you withdrawing the compliment?"
99 "Re-enforcing it, maybe. Something is pretty when it pleases the eye--it is more than that when—"
100 "If it saddens?" she interrupted hastily.
101 "Exactly."
102 "It must be ugly."
103 "Always?"
104 Toward the west, the sunlight lay on the dimming waters in a broad, glinting streamer of crimsoned gold.
105 "No, of course you are right."
106 "Why did you say this is the last time?" he asked quietly as they turned back.
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107 "I am going home."
108 The end of an impossible dream!
109 "When?" after a long silence.
110
111
"Tomorrow. I received a letter from Father and Mother yesterday. They want me to spend Holy Week at home."
She seemed to be waiting for him to speak. "That is why I said this is the last time."
112 "Can't I come to say good-bye?"
113 "Oh, you don't need to!"
114 "No, but I want to."
115 "There is no time."
116 The golden streamer was withdrawing, shortening, until it looked no more than a pool far away at the rim of the world. Stillness, a vibrant quiet that affects the senses as does solemn harmony; a peace that is not contentment but a cessation of tumult when all violence of feeling tones down to the wistful serenity of regret.
She turned and looked into his face, in her dark eyes a ghost of sunset sadness.
117 "Home seems so far from here. This is almost like another life."
118 "I know. This is Elsewhere, and yet strange enough, I cannot get rid of the old things."
119 "Old things?"
120 "Oh, old things, mistakes, encumbrances, old baggage." He said it lightly, unwilling to mar the hour. He walked close, his hand sometimes touching hers for one whirling second.
121 Don Julian's nasal summons came to them on the wind.
122 Alfredo gripped the soft hand so near his own. At his touch, the girl turned her face away, but he heard her voice say very low, "Good-bye."
II
123 ALFREDO Salazar turned to the right where, farther on, the road broadened and entered the heart of the town—heart of Chinese stores sheltered under low-hung roofs, of indolent drug stores and tailor shops, of dingy shoe-repairing establishments, and a cluttered goldsmith's cubbyhole where a consumptive bent over a magnifying lens; heart of old brick-roofed houses with quaint hand-andball knockers on the door; heart of grass-grown plaza reposeful with trees, of ancient church and convento, now circled by swallows gliding in flight as smooth
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and soft as the afternoon itself. Into the quickly deepening twilight, the voice of the biggest of the church bells kept ringing its insistent summons. Flocking came the devout with their long wax candles, young women in vivid apparel (for this was Holy Thursday and the Lord was still alive), older women in sober black skirts. Came too the young men in droves, elbowing each other under the talisay tree near the church door. The gaily decked rice-paper lanterns were again on display while from the windows of the older houses hung colored glass globes, heirlooms from a day when grasspith wicks floating in coconut oil were the chief lighting device.
124 Soon a double row of lights emerged from the church and uncoiled down the length of the street like a huge jewelled band studded with glittering clusters where the saints' platforms were. Above the measured music rose the untutored voices of the choir, steeped in incense and the acrid fumes of burning wax.
125 The sight of Esperanza and her mother sedately pacing behind Our Lady of
Sorrows suddenly destroyed the illusion of continuity and broke up those lines of light into component individuals. Esperanza stiffened self-consciously, tried to look unaware, and could not.
126 The line moved on.
127 Suddenly, Alfredo's slow blood began to beat violently, irregularly. A girl was coming down the line—a girl that was striking, and vividly alive, the woman that could cause violent commotion in his heart, yet had no place in the completed ordering of his life.
128 Her glance of abstracted devotion fell on him and came to a brief stop.
129 The line kept moving on, wending its circuitous route away from the church and then back again, where, according to the old proverb, all processions end.
130 At last Our Lady of Sorrows entered the church, and with her the priest and the choir, whose voices now echoed from the arched ceiling. The bells rang the close of the procession.
131 A round orange moon, "huge as a winnowing basket," rose lazily into a clear sky, whitening the iron roofs and dimming the lanterns at the windows. Along the still densely shadowed streets the young women with their rear guard of males loitered and, maybe, took the longest way home.
132 Toward the end of the row of Chinese stores, he caught up with Julia Salas. The crowd had dispersed into the side streets, leaving Calle Real to those who lived farther out. It was past eight, and Esperanza would be expecting him in a little while: yet the thought did not hurry him as he said "Good evening" and fell into step with the girl.
133 "I had been thinking all this time that you had gone," he said in a voice that was both excited and troubled.
134 "No, my sister asked me to stay until they are ready to go."
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135 "Oh, is the Judge going?"
136 "Yes."
137 The provincial docket had been cleared, and Judge del Valle had been assigned elsewhere. As lawyer—and as lover—Alfredo had found that out long before.
138 "Mr. Salazar," she broke into his silence, "I wish to congratulate you."
139 Her tone told him that she had learned, at last. That was inevitable.
140 "For what?"
141 "For your approaching wedding."
142
143
Some explanation was due her, surely. Yet what could he say that would not offend?
"I should have offered congratulations long before, but you know mere visitors are slow about getting the news," she continued.
144 He listened not so much to what she said as to the nuances in her voice. He heard nothing to enlighten him, except that she had reverted to the formal tones of early acquaintance. No revelation there; simply the old voice—cool, almost detached from personality, flexible and vibrant, suggesting potentialities of song.
145 "Are weddings interesting to you?" he finally brought out quietly
146 "When they are of friends, yes."
147 "Would you come if I asked you?"
148 "When is it going to be?"
149 "May," he replied briefly, after a long pause.
150 "May is the month of happiness they say," she said, with what seemed to him a shade of irony.
151 "They say," slowly, indifferently. "Would you come?"
152 "Why not?"
153 "No reason. I am just asking. Then you will?"
154 "If you will ask me," she said with disdain.
155 "Then I ask you."
156 "Then I will be there."
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157 The gravel road lay before them; at the road's end the lighted windows of the house on the hill. There swept over the spirit of Alfredo Salazar a longing so keen that it was pain, a wish that, that house were his, that all the bewilderments of the present were not, and that this woman by his side were his long wedded wife, returning with him to the peace of home.
158 "Julita," he said in his slow, thoughtful manner, "did you ever have to choose between something you wanted to do and something you had to do?"
159 "No!"
160 "I thought maybe you had had that experience; then you could understand a man who was in such a situation."
161 "You are fortunate," he pursued when she did not answer.
162 "Is--is this man sure of what he should do?"
163 "I don't know, Julita. Perhaps not. But there is a point where a thing escapes us and rushes downward of its own weight, dragging us along. Then it is foolish to ask whether one will or will not, because it no longer depends on him."
164 "But then why—why—" her muffled voice came. "Oh, what do I know? That is his problem after all."
165 "Doesn't it—interest you?"
166 "Why must it? I—I have to say good-bye, Mr. Salazar; we are at the house."
167 Without lifting her eyes she quickly turned and walked away.
168 Had the final word been said? He wondered. It had. Yet a feeble flutter of hope trembled in his mind though set against that hope were three years of engagement, a very near wedding, perfect understanding between the parents, his own conscience, and Esperanza herself—Esperanza waiting, Esperanza no longer young, Esperanza the efficient, the literal-minded, the intensely acquisitive.
169 He looked attentively at her where she sat on the sofa, appraisingly, and with a kind of aversion which he tried to control.
170 She was one of those fortunate women who have the gift of uniformly acceptable appearance. She never surprised one with unexpected homeliness nor with startling reserves of beauty. At home, in church, on the street, she was always herself, a woman past first bloom, light and clear of complexion, spare of arms and of breast, with a slight convexity to thin throat; a woman dressed with selfconscious care, even elegance; a woman distinctly not average.
171 She was pursuing an indignant relation about something or other, something about Calixta, their note-carrier, Alfredo perceived, so he merely half-listened, understanding imperfectly. At a pause he drawled out to fill in the gap: "Well, what of it?" The remark sounded ruder than he had intended.
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172 "She is not married to him," Esperanza insisted in her thin, nervously pitched voice. "Besides, she should have thought of us. Nanay practically brought her up.
We never thought she would turn out bad."
173 What had Calixta done? Homely, middle-aged Calixta?
174 "You are very positive about her badness," he commented dryly. Esperanza was always positive.
175 "But do you approve?"
176 "Of what?"
177 "What she did."
178 "No," indifferently.
179 "Well?"
180 He was suddenly impelled by a desire to disturb the unvexed orthodoxy of her mind. "All I say is that it is not necessarily wicked."
181 "Why shouldn't it be? You talked like an—immoral man. I did not know that your ideas were like that."
182 "My ideas?" he retorted, goaded by a deep, accumulated exasperation. "The only test I wish to apply to conduct is the test of fairness. Am I injuring anybody? No?
Then I am justified in my conscience. I am right. Living with a man to whom she is not married—is that it? It may be wrong, and again it may not."
183 "She has injured us. She was ungrateful." Her voice was tight with resentment.
184 "The trouble with you, Esperanza, is that you are—" he stopped, appalled by the passion in his voice.
185 "Why do you get angry? I do not understand you at all! I think I know why you have been indifferent to me lately. I am not blind, or deaf; I see and hear what perhaps some are trying to keep from me." The blood surged into his very eyes and his hearing sharpened to points of acute pain. What would she say next?
186 "Why don't you speak out frankly before it is too late? You need not think of me and of what people will say." Her voice trembled.
187 Alfredo was suffering as he could not remember ever having suffered before.
What people will say—what will they not say? What don't they say when long engagements are broken almost on the eve of the wedding?
188 "Yes," he said hesitatingly, diffidently, as if merely thinking aloud, "one tries to be fair—according to his lights—but it is hard. One would like to be fair to one's self first. But that is too easy, one does not dare—"
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189 "What do you mean?" she asked with repressed violence. "Whatever my shortcomings, and no doubt they are many in your eyes, I have never gone out of my way, of my place, to find a man."
190 Did she mean by this irrelevant remark that he it was who had sought her; or was that a covert attack on Julia Salas?
191 "Esperanza—" a desperate plea lay in his stumbling words. "If you—suppose I—"
Yet how could a mere man word such a plea?
192 "If you mean you want to take back your word, if you are tired of—why don't you tell me you are tired of me?" she burst out in a storm of weeping that left him completely shamed and unnerved.
193 The last word had been said.
III
194 AS Alfredo Salazar leaned against the boat rail to watch the evening settling over the lake, he wondered if Esperanza would attribute any significance to this trip of his. He was supposed to be in Sta. Cruz whither the case of the People of the
Philippine Islands vs. Belina et al had kept him, and there he would have been if
Brigida Samuy had not been so important to the defense. He had to find that elusive old woman. That the search was leading him to that particular lake town which was Julia Salas' home should not disturb him unduly Yet he was disturbed to a degree utterly out of proportion to the prosaicalness of his errand. That inner tumult was no surprise to him; in the last eight years he had become used to such occasional storms. He had long realized that he could not forget Julia Salas.
Still, he had tried to be content and not to remember too much. The climber of mountains who has known the back-break, the lonesomeness, and the chill, finds a certain restfulness in level paths made easy to his feet. He looks up sometimes from the valley where settles the dusk of evening, but he knows he must not heed the radiant beckoning. Maybe, in time, he would cease even to look up.
195 He was not unhappy in his marriage. He felt no rebellion: only the calm of capitulation to what he recognized as irresistible forces of circumstance and of character. His life had simply ordered itself; no more struggles, no more stirring up of emotions that got a man nowhere. From his capacity of complete detachment he derived a strange solace. The essential himself, the himself that had its being in the core of his thought, would, he reflected, always be free and alone. When claims encroached too insistently, as sometimes they did, he retreated into the inner fastness, and from that vantage he saw things and people around him as remote and alien, as incidents that did not matter. At such times did Esperanza feel baffled and helpless; he was gentle, even tender, but immeasurably far away, beyond her reach.
196 Lights were springing into life on the shore. That was the town, a little up-tilted town nestling in the dark greenness of the groves. A snubcrested belfry stood beside the ancient church. On the outskirts the evening smudges glowed red through the sinuous mists of smoke that rose and lost themselves in the purple shadows of the hills. There was a young moon which grew slowly luminous as the coral tints in the sky yielded to the darker blues of evening.
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197 The vessel approached the landing quietly, trailing a wake of long golden ripples on the dark water. Peculiar hill inflections came to his ears from the crowd assembled to meet the boat—slow, singing cadences, characteristic of the Laguna lake-shore speech. From where he stood he could not distinguish faces, so he had no way of knowing whether the presidente was there to meet him or not.
Just then a voice shouted.
198 "Is the abogado there? Abogado!"
199 "What abogado?" someone irately asked.
200 That must be the presidente, he thought, and went down to the landing.
201 It was a policeman, a tall pock-marked individual. The presidente had left with
Brigida Samuy—Tandang "Binday"—that noon for Santa Cruz. Señor Salazar's second letter had arrived late, but the wife had read it and said, "Go and meet the abogado and invite him to our house."
202 Alfredo Salazar courteously declined the invitation. He would sleep on board since the boat would leave at four the next morning anyway. So the presidente had received his first letter? Alfredo did not know because that official had not sent an answer. "Yes," the policeman replied, "but he could not write because we heard that Tandang Binday was in San Antonio so we went there to find her."
203 San Antonio was up in the hills! Good man, the presidente! He, Alfredo, must do something for him. It was not every day that one met with such willingness to help.
204 Eight o'clock, lugubriously tolled from the bell tower, found the boat settled into a somnolent quiet. A cot had been brought out and spread for him, but it was too bare to be inviting at that hour. It was too early to sleep: he would walk around the town. His heart beat faster as he picked his way to shore over the rafts made fast to sundry piles driven into the water.
205 How peaceful the town was! Here and there a little tienda was still open, its dim light issuing forlornly through the single window which served as counter. An occasional couple sauntered by, the women's chinelas making scraping sounds.
From a distance came the shrill voices of children playing games on the street-tubigan perhaps, or "hawk-and-chicken." The thought of Julia Salas in that quiet place filled him with a pitying sadness.
206 How would life seem now if he had married Julia Salas? Had he meant anything to her? That unforgettable red-and-gold afternoon in early April haunted him with a sense of incompleteness as restless as other unlaid ghosts. She had not married--why? Faithfulness, he reflected, was not a conscious effort at regretful memory. It was something unvolitional, maybe a recurrent awareness of irreplaceability. Irrelevant trifles--a cool wind on his forehead, far-away sounds as of voices in a dream--at times moved him to an oddly irresistible impulse to listen as to an insistent, unfinished prayer.
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207 A few inquiries led him to a certain little tree-ceilinged street where the young moon wove indistinct filigrees of fight and shadow. In the gardens the cotton tree threw its angular shadow athwart the low stone wall; and in the cool, stilly midnight the cock's first call rose in tall, soaring jets of sound. Calle Luz.
208 Somehow or other, he had known that he would find her house because she would surely be sitting at the window. Where else, before bedtime on a moonlit night? The house was low and the light in the sala behind her threw her head into unmistakable relief. He sensed rather than saw her start of vivid surprise.
209 "Good evening," he said, raising his hat.
210 "Good evening. Oh! Are you in town?"
211 "On some little business," he answered with a feeling of painful constraint.
212 "Won't you come up?"
213 He considered. His vague plans had not included this. But Julia Salas had left the window, calling to her mother as she did so. After a while, someone came downstairs with a lighted candle to open the door. At last--he was shaking her hand.
214 She had not changed much—a little less slender, not so eagerly alive, yet something had gone. He missed it, sitting opposite her, looking thoughtfully into her fine dark eyes. She asked him about the home town, about this and that, in a sober, somewhat meditative tone. He conversed with increasing ease, though with a growing wonder that he should be there at all. He could not take his eyes from her face. What had she lost? Or was the loss his? He felt an impersonal curiosity creeping into his gaze. The girl must have noticed, for her cheek darkened in a blush.
215 Gently—was it experimentally?—he pressed her hand at parting; but his own felt undisturbed and emotionless. Did she still care? The answer to the question hardly interested him.
216 The young moon had set, and from the uninviting cot he could see one half of a star-studded sky.
217 So that was all over.
218 Why had he obstinately clung to that dream?
219 So all these years—since when?—he had been seeing the light of dead stars, long extinguished, yet seemingly still in their appointed places in the heavens.
220 An immense sadness as of loss invaded his spirit, a vast homesickness for some immutable refuge of the heart far away where faded gardens bloom again, and where live on in unchanging freshness, the dear, dead loves of vanished youth.
(1925)
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Meet the Writer
PAZ MARQUEZ BENITEZ, born in 1894 in Lucena City, Quezon, authored the first
Filipino modern English-language short story, Dead Stars, published in the Philippine
Herald in 1925. Born into the prominent Marquez family of Quezon province, she was among the first generation of Filipinos trained in the American education system which used English as the medium of instruction. She graduated high school in
Tayabas High School (now, Quezon National High School) and college from the
University of the Philippines with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1912. She was a member of the first freshman class of the University of the Philippines, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1912.
Two years after graduation, she married UP College of Education Dean Francisco
Benítez, with whom she had four children.
Márquez-Benítez later became a teacher at the University of the Philippines, who taught short-story writing and had become an influential figure to many Filipino writers in the English language, such as Loreto Paras-Sulit, Paz M. Latorena, Arturo
B. Rotor, Bienvenido N. Santos and Francisco Arcellana. The annually held Paz
Marquez-Benitez Lectures in the Philippines honors her memory by focusing on the contribution of Filipino women writers to Philippine Literature in the English language.
Though she only had one more published short story after “Dead Stars” entitled "A
Night In The Hills", she made her mark in Philippine literature because her work is considered the first modern Philippine short story.
For Marquez-Benitez, writing was a life-long occupation. In 1919 she founded
"Woman's Home Journal", the first women's magazine in the country. "Filipino Love
Stories", reportedly the first anthology of Philippine stories in English by Filipinos, was compiled in 1928 by Marquez-Benitez from the works of her students.
When her husband died in 1951, she took over as editor of the Philippine Journal of
Education at UP. She held the editorial post for over two decades.
In 1995, her daughter, Virginia Benitez-Licuanan wrote her biography, "Paz Marquez-
Benitez: One Woman's Life, Letters, and Writings."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paz_Marquez-Benitez)
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1 Usually I was in bed by ten and up by five and thus was ready for one more day of my fourteenth year. Unless Grandmother had forgotten, the fifteen centavos for the baker down Progreso Street - and how I enjoyed jingling those coins in my pocket!- would be in the empty fruit jar in the cupboard. I would remember then that rolls were what Grandmother wanted because recently she had lost three molars. For young people like my cousins and myself, she had always said that the kind called pan de sal ought to be quite all right.
2 The bread of salt! How did it get that name? From where did its flavor come, through what secret action of flour and yeast? At the risk of being jostled from the counter by early buyers, I would push my way into the shop so that I might watch the men who, stripped to the waist, worked their long flat wooden spades in and out of the glowing maw of the oven. Why did the bread come nut-brown and the size of my little fist? And why did it have a pair of lips convulsed into a painful frown? In the half light of the street, and hurrying, the paper bag pressed to my chest, I felt my curiosity a little gratified by the oven-fresh warmth of the bread I was proudly bringing home for breakfast.
3 Well I knew how Grandmother would not mind if I nibbled away at one piece; perhaps, I might even eat two, to be charged later against my share at the table.
But that would be betraying a trust; and so, indeed, I kept my purchase intact.
To guard it from harm, I watched my steps and avoided the dark street corners.
4 For my reward, I had only to look in the direction of the sea wall and the fifty yards or so of riverbed beyond it, where an old Spaniard's house stood. At low tide, when the bed was dry and the rocks glinted with broken bottles, the stone fence of the Spaniard's compound set off the house as if it were a castle. Sunrise brought a wash of silver upon the roofs of the laundry and garden sheds which had been built low and close to the fence. On dull mornings the light dripped from the bamboo screen which covered the veranda and hung some four or five yards from the ground. Unless it was August, when the damp, northeast monsoon had to be kept away from the rooms, three servants raised the screen promptly at six-thirty until it was completely hidden under the veranda eaves.
From the sound of the pulleys, I knew it was time to set out for school.
5 It was in his service, as a coconut plantation overseer, that Grandfather had spent the last thirty years of his life. Grandmother had been widowed three years now. I often wondered whether I was being depended upon to spend the years ahead in the service of this great house. One day I learned that Aida, a classmate in high school, was the old Spaniard's niece. All my doubts disappeared. It was as if, before his death, Grandfather had spoken to me about her, concealing the seriousness of the matter by putting it over as a joke. If now I kept true to the
7 virtues, she would step out of her bedroom ostensibly to say Good Morning to her uncle. Her real purpose, I knew, was to reveal thus her
6 assent to my desire.
On quiet mornings I imagined the patter of her shoes upon the wooden veranda floor as a further sign, and I would hurry off to school, taking the route she had
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fixed for me past the post office, the town plaza and the church, the health center east of the plaza, and at last the school grounds. I asked myself whether I would try to walk with her and decided it would be the height of rudeness.
Enough that in her blue skirt and white middy she would be half a block ahead and, from that distance, perhaps throw a glance in my direction, to bestow upon my heart a deserved and abundant blessing. I believed it was but right that, in some such way as this, her mission in my life was disguised.
8 Her name, I was to learn many years later, was a convenient mnemonic for the qualities to which argument might aspire. But in those days it was a living voice.
"Oh that you might be worthy of uttering me," it said. And how I endeavored to build my body so that I might live long to honor her. With every victory at singles at the handball court the game was then the craze at school -- I could feel my body glow in the sun as though it had instantly been cast in bronze. I guarded my mind and did not let my wits go astray. In class I would not allow a lesson to pass unmastered. Our English teacher could put no question before us that did not have a ready answer in my head. One day he read Robert Louis Stevenson's
The Sire de Maletroit's Door, and we were so enthralled that our breaths trembled. I knew then that somewhere, sometime in the not too improbable
9 future, a benign old man with a lantern in his hand would also detain me in a secret room, and there daybreak would find me thrilled by the sudden certainty that I had won Aida's hand.
10 It was perhaps on my violin that her name wrought such a tender spell. Maestro
Antonino remarked the dexterity of my stubby fingers. Quickly I raced through
Alard-until I had all but committed two thirds of the book to memory. My short, brown arm learned at last to draw the bow with grace. Sometimes, when practising my scales in the early evening, I wondered if the sea wind carrying the straggling notes across the pebbled river did not transform them into Schubert's
"Serenade."
11 At last Mr. Custodio, who was in charge of our school orchestra, became aware of my progress. He moved me from second to first violin. During the Thanksgiving
Day program he bade me render a number, complete with pizzicato and harmonics.
12 "Another Vallejo! Our own Albert Spalding!" I heard from the front row.
13 Aida, I thought, would be in the audience. I looked around quickly but could not see her. As I retired to my place in the orchestra I heard Pete Saez, the trombone player, call my name.
14 "You must join my band," he said. "Look, we'll have many engagements soon.
It'll be vacation time."
15 Pete pressed my arm. He had for some time now been asking me to join the
Minviluz Orchestra, his private band. All I had been able to tell him was that I had my schoolwork to mind. He was twenty-two. I was perhaps too young to be going around with him. He earned his school fees and supported his mother hiring out his band at least three or four times a month. He now said:
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16 "Tomorrow we play at the funeral of a Chinese-four to six in the afternoon; in the evening, judge Roldan's silver wedding anniversary; Sunday, the municipal dance."
17 My head began to whirl. On the stage, in front of us, the principal had begun a speech about America. Nothing he could say about the Pilgrim Fathers and the
American custom of feasting on turkey seemed interesting. I thought of the money I would earn. For several days now I had but one wish, to buy a box of linen stationery. At night when the house was quiet I would fill the sheets with words that would tell Aida how much I adored her. One of these mornings, perhaps before school closed for the holidays, I would borrow her algebra book and there, upon a good pageful of equations, there I would slip my message, tenderly pressing the leaves of the book. She would perhaps never write back.
Neither by post nor by hand would a reply reach me. But no matter; it would be a silence full of voices.
18 That night I dreamed I had returned from a tour of the world's music centers; the newspapers of Manila had been generous with praise. I saw my picture on the cover of a magazine. A writer had described how, many years ago, I used to trudge the streets of Buenavista with my violin in a battered black cardboard case. In New York, he reported, a millionaire had offered me a Stradivarius violin, with a card that bore the inscription: "In admiration of a genius your own people must surely be proud of." I dreamed I spent a weekend at the millionaire's country house by the Hudson. A young girl in a blue skirt and white middy clapped her lily-white hands and, her voice trembling, cried "Bravo!"
19 What people now observed at home was the diligence with which I attended to my violin lessons. My aunt, who had come from the farm to join her children for the holidays, brought with her a maidservant, and to the poor girl was given the chore of taking the money to the baker's for rolls and pan de sal. I realized at once that it would be no longer becoming on my part to make these morning trips to the baker's. I could not thank my aunt enough.
20 I began to chafe on being given other errands. Suspecting my violin to be the excuse, my aunt remarked:
21 "What do you want to be a musician for? At parties, musicians always eat last."
22 Perhaps, I said to myself, she was thinking of a pack of dogs scrambling for scraps tossed over the fence by some careless kitchen maid. She was the sort you could depend on to say such vulgar things. For that reason, I thought, she ought not to be taken seriously at all.
23 But the remark hurt me. Although Grandmother had counseled me kindly to mind my work at school, I went again and again to Pete Saez's house for rehearsals.
24 She had demanded that I deposit with her my earnings; I had felt too weak to refuse. Secretly, I counted the money and decided not to ask for it until I had enough with which to buy a brooch. Why this time I wanted to give Aida a brooch, I didn't know. But I had set my heart on it. I searched the downtown shops. The Chinese clerks, seeing me so young, were annoyed when I inquired about prices.
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25 At last the Christmas season began. I had not counted on Aida's leaving home, and remembering that her parents lived in Badajoz, my torment was almost unbearable. Not once had I tried to tell her of my love. My letters had remained unwritten, and the algebra book unborrowed. There was still the brooch to find, but I could not decide on the sort of brooch I really wanted. And the money, in any case, was in Grandmother's purse, which smelled of "Tiger Balm." I grew somewhat feverish as our class Christmas program drew near. Finally it came; it was a warm December afternoon. I decided to leave the room when our English teacher announced that members of the class might exchange gifts. I felt fortunate; Pete was at the door, beckoning to me. We walked out to the porch where, Pete said, he would tell me a secret.
26 It was about an asalto the next Sunday which the Buenavista Women's Club wished to give Don Esteban's daughters, Josefina and Alicia, who were arriving on the morning steamer from Manila. The spinsters were much loved by the ladies. Years ago, when they were younger, these ladies studied solfeggio with
Josefina and the piano and harp with Alicia. As Pete told me all this, his lips ashgray from practising all morning on his trombone, I saw in my mind the sisters in their silk dresses, shuffling off to church for theevening benediction. They were very devout, and the Buenavista ladies admired that. I had almost forgotten that they were twins and, despite their age, often dressed alike. In low-bosomed voile bodices and white summer hats, I remembered, the pair had attended
Grandfather's funeral, at old Don Esteban's behest. I wondered how successful they had been in Manila during the past three years in the matter of finding suitable husbands.
27 "This party will be a complete surprise," Pete said, looking around the porch as if to swear me to secrecy. "They've hired our band."
28 I joined my classmates in the room, greeting everyone with a Merry Christmas jollier than that of the others. When I saw Aida in one corner unwrapping something two girls had given her, I found the boldness to greet her also.
29 "Merry Christmas," I said in English, as a hairbrush and a powder case emerged from the fancy wrapping. It seemed to me rather apt that such gifts went to her.
Already several girls were gathered around Aida. Their eyes glowed with envy, it seemed to me, for those fair cheeks and the bobbed dark-brown hair which lineage had denied them. I was too dumbstruck by my own meanness to hear exactly what Aida said in answer to my greeting. But I recovered shortly and asked:
30 "Will you be away during the vacation?"
31 "No, I'll be staying here," she said. When she added that her cousins were arriving and that a big party in their honor was being planned, I remarked:
32 "So you know all about it?" I felt I had to explain that the party was meant to be a surprise, an asalto.
33 And now it would be nothing of the kind, really. The women's club matrons would hustle about, disguising their scurrying around for cakes and candies as for some
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baptismal party or other. In the end, the Rivas sisters would outdo them. Boxes of meringues, bonbons, ladyfingers, and cinnamon buns that only the Swiss bakers in Manila could make were perhaps coming on the boat with them. I imagined a table glimmering with long-stemmed punch glasses; enthroned in that array would be a huge brick-red bowl of gleaming china with golden flowers around the brim. The local matrons, however hard they tried, however sincere their efforts, were bound to fail in their aspiration to rise to the level of Don
Esteban's daughters. Perhaps, I thought, Aida knew all this. And that I should share in a foreknowledge of the matrons' hopes was a matter beyond love. Aida
34 and I could laugh together with the gods.
35 At seven, on the appointed evening, our small band gathered quietly at the gate of Don Esteban's house, and when the ladies arrived in their heavy shawls and trim panuelo, twittering with excitement, we were commanded to play the Poet and Peasant overture. As Pete directed the band, his eyes glowed with pride for his having been part of the big event. The multicolored lights that the old
Spaniard's gardeners had strung along the vine-covered fence were switched on, and the women remarked that Don Esteban's daughters might have made some preparations after all. Pete hid his face from the glare. If the women felt let down, they did not show it.
36 The overture shuffled along to its climax while five men in white shirts bore huge boxes of goods into the house. I recognized one of the bakers in spite of the uniform. A chorus of confused greetings, and the women trooped into the house; and before we had settled in the sala to play "A Basket of Roses," the heavy damask curtains at the far end of the room were drawn and a long table richly spread was revealed under the chandeliers. I remembered that, in our haste to be on hand for the asalto, Pete and I had discouraged the members of the band from taking their suppers.
37 "You've done us a great honor!" Josefina, the more buxom of the twins, greeted the ladies.
38 "Oh, but you have not allowed us to take you by surprise!" the ladies demurred in a chorus.
39 There were sighs and further protestations amid a rustle of skirts and the glitter of earrings. I saw Aida in a long, flowing white gown and wearing an arch of sampaguita flowers on her hair. At her command, two servants brought out a gleaming harp from the music room. Only the slightest scraping could be heard because the servants were barefoot. As Aida directed them to place the instrument near the seats we occupied, my heart leaped to my throat. Soon she was lost among the guests, and we played "The Dance of the Glowworms." I kept my eyes closed and held for as long as I could her radiant figure before me.
40 Alicia played on the harp and then, in answer to the deafening applause, she offered an encore. Josefina sang afterward. Her voice, though a little husky, fetched enormous sighs. For her encore, she gave "The Last Rose of Summer"; and the song brought back snatches of the years gone by. Memories of solfeggio lessons eddied about us, as if there were rustling leaves scattered all over the hall. Don Esteban appeared. Earlier, he had greeted the crowd handsomely, twisting his mustache to hide a natural shyness before talkative women. He
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stayed long enough to listen to the harp again, whispering in his rapture:
"Heavenly. Heavenly . . ."
41 By midnight, the merrymaking lagged. We played while the party gathered around the great table at the end of the sala. My mind traveled across the seas to the distant cities I had dreamed about. The sisters sailed among the ladies like two great white liners amid a fleet of tugboats in a bay. Someone had thoughtfully remembered-and at last Pete Saez signaled to us to put our instruments away. We walked in single file across the hall, led by one of the barefoot servants.
42 Behind us a couple of hoarse sopranos sang "La Paloma" to the accompaniment of the harp, but I did not care to find out who they were. The sight of so much silver and china confused me. There was more food before us than I had ever imagined. I searched in my mind for the names of the dishes; but my ignorance appalled me. I wondered what had happened to the boxes of food that the
Buenavista ladies had sent up earlier. In a silver bowl was something, I discovered, that appeared like whole egg yolks that had been dipped in honey and peppermint. The seven of us in the orchestra were all of one mind about the feast; and so, confident that I was with friends, I allowed my covetousness to have its sway and not only stuffed my mouth with this and that confection but also wrapped up a quantity of those egg-yolk things in several sheets of napkin paper. None of my companions had thought of doing the same, and it was with
43 some pride that I slipped the packet under my shirt. There, I knew, it would not bulge.
44 "Have you eaten?"
45 I turned around. It was Aida. My bow tie seemed to tighten around my collar. I mumbled something, I did not know what.
46 "If you wait a little while till they've gone, I'll wrap up a big package for you," she added.
47 I brought a handkerchief to my mouth. I might have honored her solicitude adequately and even relieved myself of any embarrassment; I could not quite believe that she had seen me, and yet I was sure that she knew what I had done, and I felt all ardor for her gone from me entirely.
48 I walked away to the nearest door, praying that the damask curtains might hide me in my shame. The door gave on to the veranda, where once my love had trod on sunbeams. Outside it was dark, and a faint wind was singing in the harbor.
49 With the napkin balled up in my hand, I flung out my arm to scatter the egg-yolk things in the dark. I waited for the soft sound of their fall on the garden-shed roof. Instead, I heard a spatter in the rising night-tide beyond the stone fence.
Farther away glimmered the light from Grandmother's window, calling me home.
50 But the party broke up at one or thereabouts. We walked away with our instruments after the matrons were done with their interminable good-byes.
Then, to the tune of "Joy to the World," we pulled the Progreso Street shopkeepers out of their beds. The Chinese merchants were especially generous.
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When Pete divided our collection under a street lamp, there was already a little glow of daybreak.
51 He walked with me part of the way home. We stopped at the baker's when I told him that I wanted to buy with my own money some bread to eat on the way to
Grandmother's house at the edge of the sea wall. He laughed, thinking it strange that I should be hungry. We found ourselves alone at the counter; and we watched the bakery assistants at work until our bodies grew warm from the oven across the door. It was not quite five, and the bread was not yet ready.
(1958)
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Meet the Writer
NÉSTOR VICENTE MADALI GONZÁLEZ was born on 8 September 1915 in
Romblon, Philippines. González, however, was raised in Calapan City, the capital of the Philippine province of Oriental Mindoro. González was a son of a school supervisor and a teacher. As a teenager, he helped his father by delivering meat door-to-door across provincial villages and municipalities. González was also a musician. He played the violin and even made four guitars by hand. He earned his first peso by playing the violin during a Chinese funeral in Romblon. González attended Mindoro High School (now Jose J. Leido Jr. Memorial National High School) from 1927 to 1930. González attended college at National University (Manila) but he was unable to finish his undergraduate degree. While in Manila, González wrote for the Philippine Graphic and later edited for the Evening News Magazine and Manila
Chronicle. His first published essay appeared in the Philippine Graphic and his first poem in Poetry in 1934. González made his mark in the Philippine writing community as a member of the Board of Advisers of Likhaan: the University of the Philippines
Creative Writing Center, founding editor of The Diliman Review and as the first president of the Philippine Writers' Association. González attended creative writing classes under Wallace Stegner and Katherine Anne Porter at Stanford University. In
1950, González returned to the Philippines and taught at the University of Santo
Tomas, the Philippine Women's University and the University of the Philippines
(U.P.). At U.P., González was only one of two faculty members accepted to teach in the university without holding a degree. On the basis of his literary publications and distinctions, González later taught at the University of California, Santa Barbara,
California State University, Hayward, the University of Washington, the University of
California, Los Angeles, and the University of California, Berkeley.
On 14 April 1987, the University of the Philippines conferred on N.V.M. González the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa, "For his creative genius in shaping the Philippine short story and novel, and making a new clearing within the
English idiom and tradition on which he established an authentic vocabulary, ...For his insightful criticism by which he advanced the literary tradition of the Filipino and enriched the vocation for all writers of the present generation...For his visions and auguries by which he gave the Filipino sense and sensibility a profound and unmistakable script read and reread throughout the international community of letters..."
N.V.M. González was proclaimed National Artist of the Philippines in 1997. He died on
28 November 1999 in Quezon City, Philippines at the age of 84. As a National Artist,
Gonzalez was honored with a state funeral at the Libingan ng mga Bayani.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NVM_Gonzalez)
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