Tuesday, February 24, 2015

ON MUSIC

ON MUSIC

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago


That I sing and make music
Brings joy and solitude to the psyche
Praise be to my wise grandfather
Of mathematical and musical genius made
From whom my bard’s mind was crafted.

Music is the holiest mover
It combines all powers of gods
From Olympus and all heavens
It shakes and rattles souls the most.

Music is certainly mathematics
Of metrics and calculus built
For which its maker anticipates
Astride rhythm and rhyme
The sonic bursts from orals and instruments.

Calculated is the world too
In music, a most moved audience
By booming sonics of its trade.


[Writ. 04 June 1991, Cubao, Quezon City, M.Manila] 

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

FEW HAVE HEART FOR THE OVERSEAS FILIPINO

FEW HAVE HEART FOR THE OVERSEAS FILIPINO

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago


Few have heart for the out-migrant
Few recognize the grinding hardships faced
In strange lands
Few sympathize yet so many beg
For the migrant’s gift when home
S/he comes –the rich person
Overnight. Overnight is saved money
Sucked too by bloodsucking kins
And neighbors and all.

Never mind the possible abuses
Or racist exploitations encountered
The compatriots surely have heart
When the migrant gives, when
And only when wine flows
And songs are sung upon arrival, when
Home is filled up by multitudes
Home is fiesta’s venue everyday!

The migrant’s absence makes people
Caricature him/her and kins
As a malignant felon.

No, nobody sympathizes with the migrant
Just wait till s/he arrives, when
The sky showers with Imeldific graces
Happy are kins and friends
Happy is government too
Happy is the merchant
Happy is everyone but
The migrant.


[Writ. 04 June 1991, Cubao, Quezon City, M.Manila]

Wednesday, February 4, 2015

A SUM OF PARASITES

A SUM OF PARASITES

Erle Frayne Argonza y Delago


To serious thinkers an X unknown
is the sum of financial technocrats
and foreign debtors

but to the paupered lot
the sum means
more tasty diets consisting
of liver flukes
of ascaris
of tuberculosis
of kwashiorkor
of bronchopneumonia
of pinworms
of schistosomiasis

A sum of parasites
is always equal to parasites
and nothing less