CRIMES

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago


The still calm of the morning
Is as deafening as stories
About crimes
Printed in the dailies
Broadcast on radio

Crime has become the cheapest
Merchandise
Flaunted by its own law
Of supply and demand
Its price roughshodly lowered
By abundance
More abundant
Than mangoes and guavas

They need not be bought at all
So much that even the harmless streets
Of recluse villages
Become zoos
Littered with
Salvaged
Bodies


[Writ. 29 May 1991, Cubao, Quezon City, M.Manila]