STA. ANA

STA. ANA

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

Cranes atop carabaos at work

Amid endless sights of rice fields

That merge with the mountains on their brims

Where thick canopies of trees add color

To the green canvass of the picturesque scenery

Here are the trademarks of the path

To Sta. Ana the forthcoming legend.

Reached by land from arterial roads

Where the traveler’s exhaustion is gaily relieved

By the vista of the cool blue sea

A limitless basin aplenty

With marine basics and exotics.

Soon there shall rise an industrial

Enclave whose merchandise will be sold

To foreign lands and peoples.

Fisherfolk, planters and workingmen meet

There in an unintended league

To realize that beauteous and bountiful

Nature and profitable shops & foundries

Can’t at all conceal miserly living.

[Writ. 05 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

CORDILLERA BEGGARS?

CORDILLERA BEGGARS?

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

O! Beloved people of Cordillera!

Please lend me true reasons

For the fact that some members

Of your proud majestic land

Now belong to beggars’ armies

In the Manila Metropolis?

I know too well that your grand mountains

Are abodes of immense wealth and lores

Of a sturdy people that has never

Been conquered nor has starved

Not the strong and tireless highlander

Who never disdains sweaty labor

And sublime service even as bountiful harvests

Are perpetually reaped for family and clan

And offered at the altar of Bathala.

Is it the handiwork of Plunder

Now magnified by the clockwork of War?

If twere so can you be extricated

From Plunderers’ predatory claws?

O! Please answer my query for you too

Are to me a noble teacher of life.

[Writ. 05 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

MENDICANT O’ STREET

MENDICANT O’ STREET

   

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

Beloved Mendicant o’ Street

Please misread not as selfishness

My apparent refusal to render you coins

When you’re on the heels

Of riders I’m astride on

Surely my heart bleeds profusely

Over your thankless predicament

Filled I am with guilt and shame

For apparent deeds of misanthropy

Each occasion of your presence

Has the whole sky come a-crashing down

Your eyes narrate the cryptic tale

Of Hades devouring the Earth

Just as my mind speaks to you

What it thinks of the occasion

That to offer you pieces of coins

Won’t transport you to amelioration

Better yet if t’were a stable job

I’d give as presents unto you which awefully I

Do not at the moment possess.

[Writ. 05 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila.]

WHY NOT HUMILITY?

WHY NOT HUMILITY?

  Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

Why not be humble at all moments

Of association with fellowmen?

Didn’t the shopworker teach you

That one rudiment of survival

Is the intelligent recognition

Of your limitations’ omnipresence

Inspite of endowments of craft & wealth?

For there too are circumstances

That are beyond you grasps

In the snares of Naivete

And may even cause a furor

Of gig and limitless giggle?

For Boastfulness and Arrogance

Are twin eagles of deception

That once they’d lift you aflight

They’d shake you off the winds to crash

Tragically on the solid ground

Of defeat and humiliation?

O! Humility!

You are a noble messenger

That speaks for transparent Security

One that makes a person immensely cherished

By the commonwealth of all men.

[Writ. 05 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

ATOMIC SLUMBER

ATOMIC SLUMBER

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

Go far away to the remotest desert

Where you’ll rest forever unnoticed

You pestilent idea of Atomic War!

Have mercy on the farmer

Who’s been wishing to raise

His family to full decency

And so too on the labourer

Whose sweat has been aspiring

To transmute into purest gold

For the betterment of basic living.

Go far away to the remotest desert

Where you’ll be buried in oblivion

You pestilent thought of Atomic War!

Have mercy on children whose smiles

And plays irradiate the world

With untarnished love and devotion

For they deserve to reap

The harvests of good works

They’re noble inheritors of Mother Earth.

Go far away to the remotest desert

Where you shall slumber forever

You pestilent idea of Atomic War!

And may the champion of the Light

Smash all Bombs—abominable icons of Lucifer—

To inutility inasmuch as Life

Has been unto everyone endowed

Not plainly to vaporize

In the hot blazing ovens

Of detonated thermonuclear devices.

[Writ. 04 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila.]