JUAN’S NIGHTMARE

JUAN’S NIGHTMARE

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

Sleeping while inner rage brews

Inside one’s cognitive vat does not make

A sleep the fulfillment of a day’s toil.

Not for Juan the unlettered and dispossessed

Whose wretchedness is a correlate of wealth

Amassed by his other brothers whose

Purses and stocks do bulge ad infinitum.

Not for Juan. Reserved inner rage

Sooner unfolds into a thousand nightmares:

Spoiled is the timeless joy of dream’s utopia.

[Writ. 19 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

FAREWELL TO A DECEASED KIN

FAREWELL TO A DECEASED KIN

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

History is Judge and Witness

to the truth that my heart is ne’er

A nest of

Resentment

for you o! deceased kin

You were never a

Creator of terror and trouble

nor villain are you for the anguish

you’d upon me outpoured from time to time

No resentment!

Be in peace as the Dove that is now

your fulfilled state.

Farewell!

[Writ. 11 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

CADAVER’S BIOGRAPHY

CADAVER’S BIOGRAPHY

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

vermin upon vermin gather in mounds

undistinguished from the morsel

felled by it’s ego’s date with Grim Ripper

25, 50, 100, etc

are found without names in named or unnamed

cemeteries

uncelebrated figures

are puzzles that are delightful to civil

libertarians’ appetites for enigmas

--shadows without tales

or felled bodies do have sagas of pain

or joy unaffected by the Roman slaughter

of holy and unholy souls on Golgotha’s foot

[Writ. 11 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

MARSHES OF CANDABA

MARSHES OF CANDABA

Erle Argonza y Delago

When hawks and other living flyers

Set foot on swampy fields for feeding

Tis a marvelous sight that glows the eyes

As mark of platonic appreciation

Where muddy waters used to fill

The air with constant foul-smelling vapors

And gift the neighboring men and women

With malaria and ailments and more

And leave no space that’s fertile enough

For crops and edible greens

And there vehicles run agog

When torrents bring oceanic floods

No more is this worthy of anyone’s esteem

Than to ignore it for its fecal state

Melons and fruits and rice now abound

In this once noxious forbidden land

No more is Hope rekindled the better

Than on the marshes of Candaba

Fly! Fly! Beloved Eagle to the peasant’s nest!

And laud him with your hymns of joy

For his victorious heartwarming travails on swamps

Indeed make him a true human champion.

[Writ. 06 June 1988, Proj. 8, Quezon City, M.Manila]

POLICEMAN

POLICEMAN

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

Policeman! Throngs of multitudes are

Waiting for your return to civility!

On account of the erosion of your image

As a reliable enforcer of statutes

By your recalcitrant engagements in

Extortions and rackets and every condemnable

Act that are well perceived by the periscopic oculars

Of the consummate public;

Come home, policeman! Come home

To the moral niche of civility!

For to extract money from laboring motorists

Traders and pedlars who may no more

Be better than the poorest fellows

Of yours whose every cent that you

Embezzle will accrue to the rupture

Of the noblest dignity;

Come home, policeman! Come home

To the powerhouse of civility!

For to bust striking workingment or to

Train guns on dissenting marchers or to

Equate to criminal acts those that are

Worthy of appreciation as they are

Motivated by desires for justice

Will cost you your sweet acceptance

By the same people whom you ought to protect;

Come home, policeman! Come home to

The sanctuary of civility!

People are surely waiting for you

Not excluding the gunslinging predators

Who are out to snatch your life

For your treachery and malevolence.

[Writ. 06 June, AUF, Angeles City, Pampanga]

WHEN YOU NEED A NEWSREPORT

WHEN YOU NEED A NEWSREPORT

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

If you’ve gone through a commotion

Or an accident of sorts

And you feel the urge to summon

Newsreporters to the scripts

Ah! Don’t ever waste your sweat

On thick layered phone directories

To call on foreign newsmen to the fore

For these souls today are hounded

On cryptic suspicions of support

They give to rebels on the hills

You might as well call up the hounders

Who are craftsmen of psywar ars

Who don’t matter if 1,000 differs from 10,000

Or whether Mr X didn’t or did commit Action Y

For as long as reports serve the purpose

Of fueling more wars and battle gores

And inflate the raison d’etre

Of brave regimentation and war mania

[Writ. 06 June 1988, AUF, Angeles City, Pampanga]

SIMPLE WORDS

SIMPLE WORDS

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago

In every production of my pen

Of full narrative or poem

I’m compelled to write in simple

Words that folks could comprehend

It’s no joke to dazzle minds

With jargons and magical words

For just like magic on a wand’s stroke

Will make the denouement outpace

The cognition of the enthusiastic viewer

Will only obscure the thought presented

And leave the consciousness dangling

On rotten vines of superstition and illusion

For I’m supposed to offer

Lines that shatter false images

It’s so that every undertaking

Of thinking and imagining

Will irradiate the knowing viewer

With rays of clarity and concreteness

[Writ. 06 June 1988, Angeles City, Pampanga, on a visit to the Angeles University Foundation.]

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.]