. . .
2016 marks the 11th year for Kultura, which emerged from the youth-led Kapisanan Phillippine Centre for Arts & Culture – a small yet ambitious initiative based out of a store-front on Augusta Avenue in Toronto’s Kensington Market neighbourhood.
The Kultura festival now celebrates the vibrant, contemporary creative expression of Filipino-Canadians. This is an important event for dialogue within the community, as well as for sharing a deeper understanding of Filipino culture and experience with the broader communities of Toronto – beyond the limiting clichés of “cultural costumes and food”. Kultura features multiple art disciplines, including culinary and fashion. Kultura aims to discuss the Filipino diaspora in Canada and to elevate Filipino-Canadian culture from the perception that it is flat and static to one that is multi-dimensional and active.
.
Kultura is the brainchild of the Kapisanan Centre, a charitable community organization with strong youth leadership. Kapisanan has created a safe space for Filipino-Canadian youth, both second generation and newcomers, to overcome multiple barriers that keep them from meaningful engagement in society. To explore identity, to foster pride and self-confidence – that’s Kapisanan!
. . .
Some contemporary Filipino-in-diaspora poetry…
Victor P. Gendrano (California)
Japanese Haiku
. . .
ospital silid hintayan
ang plastik na mga bulaklak
palaging bukad
.
waiting room
the plastic flowers
always in bloom
. . .
pinagbiling bahay
puno ng halakhak
ng maga bata
.
sold house
children’s laughter echoes
from its bare walls
.
(2005)
. . .
Japanese Tanka
. . .
chopping onions
enough excuse
to shed my tears
as I cook for myself
this New Year’s eve
.
di lang sibuyas
sanhi ng pagluha
kundi sa pangungulila
pagluluto sa sarili
ngayong bagong taon
. . .
scent of jasmine wafts
through her open door
this sultry evening
she calls him to say
don’t be late coming
.
the torn jacket
and worn-out cane
lie near a trash bin
his chuckle still echoes
from the empty bed
.
(2007)
. . .
Aloneness (a Korean Sijo)
.
the visiting son laments
his loss of their backyard tree
.
where as a teen he carved a heart
to express his very first love
.
his widower dad explains
twice there I tried to hang myself
. . .
Alheizmer Disease
.
as I brush mom’s golden hair
she keeps talking to unseen friends
.
she accepts me now as a friend
in the hospice where she lives
.
sometimes I wonder if she knows
I am her least-liked daughter
.
(2007)
. . .
Victor P. Gendrano is a retired librarian from the Los Angeles County Public Library. He completed his Bsc in the Phillippines and his Msc at Syracuse University in New York state. From 1987 to 1999 he edited Heritage Magazine, an English-language quarterly. His website, Haiku and Tanka Harvest, focuses on his poetry in a variety of structured forms and styles, as well as free verse in English and Tagalog. Mr. Gendrano is the author of Rustle of Bamboo Leaves: selected haiku and other poems, published in 2005.
. . .
H. Francisco V. Peñones, Jr.
Homage to Frida
(On the Centennial of her Birth)
.
Kahlo: kaluluwa: (n). Tagalog for soul ––
O Soul of my bleeding heart pigeon-
holed in tin retablos hung in antiseptic wards
unwind your bandaged flesh and let me in
your body its plains of crumbling rocks
and howling dust is no strange country
to me. Buko kanakong estranyo ‘di.
Back home, the land cracks and opens wide
throwing up the bodies dumped at night.
Its womb refusing now any stirring of seedling
despite so much marrows in its furrows.
O Nuestra Señora de Dolores y Tristezas*
wrap me in your leafy arms as you did
Diego Rivera or yourself in infants’ bodies
yet with your lusting faces in a kind of pietà,
in a loving moment caged in the canvas.
Arog ka kanakong banwaan, (like my country)
Natusok naman ako. (I am pierced too.)
Pero en sus autoretratos por ejemplo**,
.
I am not pricked by the thorns of the cactus
which thrusts up like a pen against the sky
and my brows are as high and thick and black
as your brushes and your gaze –– a doll’s,
set in place and silent in a corner yet forever.
. . .
*Our Lady of Sorrows and Sadness
**But in her self-portraits, for example
. . .
Self Portents from a Crystal Ball
.
Between the onyx equinox
and the Martian meridian
your Saturn son is on the ascendant
towards the power clique.
Rorschach stains
whirl nebulous as violet capes
worn in Salamanca:
Beware of men in ties,
they shake your hands while
coming out straight from the john.
Swirling lights tie up
the head and the tail, a circular
tale and mandala of survival and decency
you may well just be
heading for St. Francis Alley.
.
Acid rain dust leaks out
slimy green in brain drain canals:
invest in futures, better still
the dioroxine fuel yet to be found
and named.
.
Some silicone spilled semen
unearth Buddy Holly, a boozed
night out in Malate
and the apparition in the 7th Virgo
of one claiming paternity.
Raspy grains the pores of skin
up close your nose oooom
a hint of civet in heat:
go pick a lady in the primary
though you keep a red card
in your wallet for lemme see…
. . .
H. Francisco V. Peñones, Jr., has studied in the MFA Creative Writing program at San Jose State University, and is acknowledged as a pioneer in the renaissance of writing literature in the Bikol language of his native Phillippines. Peñones’ first poetry collection, entitled Ragang Rinaranga (Belovéd Land) was published in 2006.
. . .
Rhodora V. Peñaranda
Great Expectation
.
The light goes off in this town of rationed power.
Brief dark shadows up and down the road.
.
A village dog picks up her scent and begins to bark.
Out of the sky, a flood of darkness with invisible beasts
.
bounding over the street and wedging into the heart.
She comes home, and out of the steaming dark,
.
her little brother, the boy like a cat waiting all night
purring for a rubbing on his back, leaps to his feet,
.
begging her to stay. She flicks her fan to spread the coolness,
and he gropes for the arts of her comfort, the tucking
.
into the soft bed, rocking him to the wind’s mothering.
But she is hurrying. She does not feel the present under her feet.
.
She does not know the future. She does not have the past.
She passes through the rooms and gathers only tedium’s grief,
.
the unwashed growth of things crowded with details, details
accelerating with the pressure of wars around her, so she leaves
.
in the veiled cold of the room,
the soft gestures curled inside the glass of a burning lamp.
Leaves him instead the words that order him
.
to face it like a man leaving him alone on a night like this
where only the dead walk, to conjure the man he has yet to be.
.
(2007)
. . .
Rhodora V. Peñaranda lives in New York state. Two of her published volumes of poetry include Touchstone (2007) and Unmasking Medusa (2008).
. . .
Edwin A. Lozada
Kansion
(in the Ilocano language)
.
Agtaytayab
Purao
Nga kalapati
Ti rimwar
Diay nabanglo
Nga sabong
Purao ken kiaw
Kiay nakaturog
Nga kalachuchi
.
Agtaytayab
Purao
Nga kalapati
Diay puso na
Agliplipias
Ti kansion
Kolor ti rosas
Ken gumamela
Nga awan pay
Ti nakangeg
.
Papanam ngay
Billit
Nga naulimek,
Sika
Ti makapagtalna
Diay langit?
Sinno ngay
Ti makangeg
Dagita regalo
Nga rumrumwar
Diay pusum?
.
Nakadanon
Idiay karayan
Ket inungwanna
Idi kuan nagpukawen
.
Didiay karayan
Agkankanta
Napunpunno ti sampaga
Rosal, rosas
Ken gumamela
. . .
Canción
.
volando va
la paloma
blanca
que salió
de la flor
perfumada
alba y ámbar
de la plumeria
adormecida
.
va volando
la paloma
blanca
su corazón desbordado
derrama
canciones
color de rosas
e hibisco
que todavía no
se han oído
.
¿adónde vas
ave callada
y mansa
tú
que apaciguas
el cielo?
¿quién sino tú
oye
los obsequios
brotando
de tu corazón?
.
a la faz del río
llegó y se acercó
dejándole un beso
y entonces desapareció
.
el río
cantando
colmado de sampaguitas
gardenias, rosas
e hibiscos
. . .
Song
.
in the midst
of flight
a white dove
emerged
from the perfumed
amber and ivory
blossom
of the plumeria
lost in slumber
.
watch it fly
as white as the clouds
the dove
with a heart
overflowing
with song
colour of roses
and hibiscus
none yet
has heard
.
where do you go
bird
so quiet and meek
you who can
appease
the heavens?
who but you
can hear
the gifts
coming forth
from your heart?
.
towards the river
the dove drew near
kissed its water and then
disappeared
.
the river
singing and flowing
with gardenias
jazmine, roses
and hibiscus
. . .
Edwin A. Lozada is a poet and translator. He also edited the volume Field of Mirrors: an Anthology of Philippine American Writers, published in 2008 by Philippine American Writers & Artists, Inc.
. . .
Patrick Rosal / Aracelis Girmay
Lamento del Gallo
.
querida gallina caída
cuéntame la historia de una semilla
que contenía
todo el universo en una espina
que picó el ojo
de la noche
me das sed y seda
.
y no te vas
y no te vas
.
y si me enseñas
la ventana de tu boca
te sequiré
por las multitudes de mentirosos
que dicen
no iré
no iré
.
ay gallina
dime algo de tu vestida tan amable
y como robaste la voz de otra ave
.
animal tú eres
animal tú eres
tan bravona
.
se cree que las estrellas fueron hechas
por una sola clave
.
y me haces buscar
por las ruinas del corazón
robándolas de los dientes de esa tierra
.
y aún escucho las susurraciones p’arriba
y no te vas en seguida
.
y no te vas
no te vas
.
querida gallina caída
sueñas sin ignorar el frío
ni el agua ni cuchillo
los lobos aúllan los versos más secretos
no hay nombre que niegue ese sonido completo
.
rompe los cristales con tus lamentos
las torres de arena y de cemento
.
manda a los gobernadores que bajen
entre las alas y tu penúltimo viento
te prometen una bala o una canción
te las prometen
te prometen
.
y no te vas
. . .
Rooster’s Lament
by Aracelis Girmay and Patrick Rosal
(English translation)
.
beloved fallen hen
tell me the story of a seed
that held
the whole universe in a thorn
that pricked the eye
of evening
.
you give me thirst and silk
.
and you don’t go
and you don’t go
.
and if you show me
the window of your mouth
i’ll follow you
through the multitudes of liars
that say
i won’t go
i won’t go
.
oh hen
tell me something about your delightful costume
and how you robbed the voice of another bird
.
animal you are
animal you are
so brave
.
it’s believed that the stars were made
by a single key
.
and you make me search
through the ruins of the heart
robbing them of the teeth of that land
.
and still i listen to the whispers above
and you don’t go
.
lovely fallen hen
you dream without ignoring the cold
nor the water nor the knife
.
the wolves howl their most secret verses
there is no name that denies that complete sound
.
smash the mirrors with your laments
the towers of sand and of cement
order the governors to descend
among the wings and your penultimate wind
they promise you a bullet or a song
they promise them to you
they promise
.
and you don’t go
. . .
Patrick Rosal has authored My American Kundiman, and Uprock Headspin Scramble and Dive, which won the Global Filipino Literary Award and the Asian American Writers’ Workshop Members’ Choice Award – respectively.
.
Aracelis Girmay is of Eritrean, Puerto Rican, and African-American descent. A writer of poetry, essays, and fiction, she earned an MFA from New York University.
. . .
Eileen R. Tabios
Die We Do
.
Die
we do
as much as
.
we live. Then
we write: right
.
what
we lived
when we write.
. . .
Morir Hacemos
.
Morir,
lo hacemos
tanto como vivir.
.
Entonces,
nosotros escribimos:
corregimos aquello que
.
vivimos
cuando, así,
nosotros lo escribimos.
. . .
Tabios’ poem originally appeared in The Light Sang As It Left Your Eyes (Marsh Hawk Press, 2007).
Translation into Spanish / Traducción del inglés al español:
Rebeka Lembo
. . .
Jon Pineda
Matamis
.
One summer in Pensacola,
I held an orange this way,
flesh hiding beneath
the texture of the rind,
then slipped my thumbs
into its core & folded it
open, like a book.
.
When I held out the halves,
the juice seemed to trace
the veins in my arms
as it dripped down to my elbows
& darkened spots of sand.
We were sitting on the beach then,
the sun, spheres of light within each piece.
I remember thinking, in Tagalog,
the word matamis is sweet in English,
though I did not say it for fear
of mispronouncing the language.
.
Instead, I finished the fruit & offered
nothing except my silence, & my father,
who pried apart another piece, breaking
the globe in two, offered me half.
Meaning everything.
. . .
Birthmark
.
After they make love, he slides down so his face rests near her waist.
The light by the bed casts its nets that turn into shadows. They both
fall asleep. When he wakes, he finds a small patch of birthmarks on
her thigh, runs his finger over each island, a spec of light brown
bundled with others to form an archipelago on her skin. For him, whose
father is from the Philippines, it is the place he has never been, filled
with hillsides of rice & fish, different dialects, a family he wants to
touch, though something about it all is untouchable, like love,
balanced between desire & longing, the way he reaches for her now, his
hand pressed near this place that seems so foreign, so much a part of
him that for a moment, he cannot help it, he feels whole.
. . .
The two poems above are from Jon Pineda’s 2004 collection Birthmark, winner of the Crab Orchard Award Series in Poetry.
. . .
Bienvenido C. Gonzalez
I Quit
.
BEAT A BAD
……………..HABIT
BY REDUCING
………………A BIT
DAILY EVERY
…………………BIT
TILL YOU RID OF
…………………..IT
. . .
PERSEVERANCE
.
IF AT FIRST YOU DON’T
SUCEEDE
SUCCEDE
SUCCEED
TRY, TRY AGAIN.
. . .
Bienvenido C. Gonzalez is a wordsmith!
He creates neo-words and logos as a hobby.
The poems above are from his PARA-PRAISES
– tributes to old and original sayings.
. . . . .
All the poems selected here are contained in the 2008 anthology Field of Mirrors, edited by Edwin A. Lozada, © Philippine American Writers & Artists, Inc.
. . . . .
