1.
How do you read
the memory tab of a loved one?
Is delirium the encrypted signals
of the soul?
That morning the caregiver
was telling him his old man
was mumbling the name
of his mother who had passed
a century ago.
His sleep was shattered
by a phone call
from the hospital…
But he wasn’t surprised at all –
like a zombie
he flowed with the crowd
of kinsmen milling around
his remains…
To engage in chatter was awkward,
hardly reverential.
Did he feel a mix
of grief & relief
that he was finally at peace?
Neuroresearch reports
the dying make real
the persona deeply buried
in his unconscious –
he was again
an abandoned child
pining for his mother
at the moment of his final departure.
Did he see the boatman
fetching his pitiful soul
at the mouth of the Acheron?
The immortal grimly rowing
to the other side,
the water eddying
in a perpetual sigh.
2.
Is Ars Moriedi only
an ancient myth?
Is there a good way to die?
Can someone stare
into death’s eye without blinking?
Freud, it is said, couldn’t give up
smoking even if it would worsen
his cancerous mouth?
Susan Sontag,
was allegedly the “fiercest
of them all”,
but even his literary claques
would lose heart
at the news her treatment
would fail…
Dylan Thomas, the Irish poet,
& drunkard, would
guzzle whisky at White House
Tavern, bloating to his
corpulent death…
What was Socrates
thinking at the violet hour?
Did he imagine turning
the tables on his prosecutors?
Was Ninoy seized by the metaphysics
of virtue when he was
escorted down to the tarmac?
Did Lazarus come back
from the dead?
Is the resurrection
the allure of Christianity?
3.
The underclass of PUP,
a university
of the proletariat,
would vote for the son
of the dictator –
Have they forgotten
the martial law regime
as if the tales
of torture & execution
were all untrue…
They will deny Walter Benjamin’s
angel
(who is he anyway?)
who would fly backward
to the horizon
with eyes fixed
on civilization’s
dark side
where monsters & beasts
hide…
The proles of the future
with eyes wide shut
see themselves
gleaming in the sun
in full flight…
O the future is theirs to own
never the night…
Their eyes closed to the grindstone,
as if God would be merciful,
never the history
of their origins
who drum up
their flea market of desire…
4.
Was it serendipitous
when he walked
into a hardware store
& fancied a heavy metal cutter?
It could be handy,
he had thought.
But was it luck?
Was God pointing him
in what direction?
Was it a preparation
for his heroic moment?
Joaquin Ronnebery of
Alesund, Norway
would eventually cut through
the perimeter
(the mission supplied him
with a light one)
of the Nazi compound
producing heavy water
for the nuclear program.
Finally, when American planes
bombed the plant,
he wouldn’t know he had virtually stopped
Hitler in his tracks.
Over biscuit & coffee,
he would shrug off his deed
as inconsequential…
The medals from the state
he didn’t care about.
The world is still unstable,
“peace must always be fought for”,
again & again & again…
What if Al-Qaida
got hold of a dirty bomb?
5.
He was born 500 years ago
in the Netherlands, but
his imagery of hell still haunts
Brugel, Goya & the Survivalists…
after Hieronymous Bosch painted
his version of hell:
“distant gallows or one beast
devouring another; grafts of butterfly
wings onto rat-faced humanoids;
a toothy fish with human legs
floating on a human; sinner impaled
on trees; another chopped into pieces
and fried in a pan…”
Will biblical rendition
by modern artists shock us into
convulsion as if
hell were only an ordinary juvenile ride
in the carnival?
What postmodern film today
would jettison us
off our comfortable seats?
Terror is a macabre ride
into the void…
Would the ruins of Palmyra
soften the hearts
of the henchmen
of the caliphate?
Could the hospital ward
in Brussels & Paris
approximate the horrors
of man-made conflagration.
How chilling is the holocaust?
The burnt children in emergency wards
cry
but we cannot answer why…
6.
Deep in the jungle
of Columbia
guerrillas are still
discussing Che Guevara
around camp fires with
Kalashnikov on the side.
Marx still rings in the air
& free love allows
union of sexes
in orderly mode…
But they are now
tinkering with laptops
& the Internet
in preparation for
the peace talks with
the state…
But how would they steer clear
of the tempest if
someone seeks to have
more than somebody else?
Cocaine has not been
profitable a trade:
The US government
has showered us the government
with 10 billion dollars
to lessen the allure
of the deal…
The rank has thinned out,
only a few hold-outs
have managed to keep
the flame burning..
Will the revolution die
in the jungle?
Times they are a-changing,
sings Bob Dylan…
Bourgeois activists
in air-conditioned suites in Manila
have opted for parliamentary
struggle…
O what
will the future hold?
O what has happened
to fire-breathing
nationalists?