THANK YOU, Philippines Graphic, for having my poems...

...grace the whole page 42 of your current July 20, '15 issue! It is truly an honor. (Philippines Free Press in 1998, then now Philippines Graphic. I guess getting published in the country's two esteemed news-and-literary paper magazines, in two consecutive centuries, ain't bad. ;) )

Now, on other "related" news. Ayon kay Senador Ralph Recto ('SONA IS POETRY, BUDGET IS PROSE'):

Poetry: State of the Nation; prose: Technical Report to the SONA and the proposed national budget.

What he isn't saying, the common Filipino's experiences and struggles:

Epic poetry: The true state of the nation.

* * *

Anyway, print on photo of page, bottom of this post, is a little too small already. So here they are:

Shadow on Bathroom Floor

I watch my shadow stare back at me without eyes,

omniscient as I perceive it to be, knowing all about me...

when it's just a splotch the lit light bulb on the ceiling,

above the toilet bowl, casts before me,

upon the tiled floor cum Rorschach test.

Okay, all-knowing it isn't. Neither is it dumb.

Or anywhere in-between. It's just there;

dark and futile mimicry of reflection.

Wing envy

Grounded humans we, wax only figuratively,

When we refer to ourselves as having those

Pairs of “membranous appendages,” of feather,

Flesh, and bone, that our avian cohabitants

Flap vigorously to fly, or hold still and extended

To glide in the blue, gray, or blue-gray sky.

But there is no direct relation between earned respect

And altitude, it seems, for those naturally endowed

To leave earth for a while.

And so the treatment, “accordingly”: If we can’t fly,

At least we do vicariously, through piercing steel

Projectiles, launched from lethal devices, also of steel.

As experts, we have learned to reach and decimate

What we can only see and aim at, but can not touch

nor soar with, solely with our bodies.

Such immense satisfaction:

To see eagle or dove plummet like a shuttlecock,

Except with feather, flesh, and bone – and blood.

(And, what's with the computer "program" that erroneously conjoins two separate words? removing the space in-between? I didn't know "norsoar" and "solelywith" would appear, prior to submission. Sorry...So please consider the above the final texts... :p Though now, with this blog post, I got a problem with the spacing between lines/stanzas/paragraphs... :( )

*  *  *

Check out My Personal Anthology (12 Poems). 

This blog is sponsored by Limitado

phone nos. 09167840522/ 023588753

and S.P.R.A.W.L.-MMA

3rd floor JN Building, 657 EDSA corner Monte De Piedad Street, Barangay Immaculate Concepcion, Cubao, Quezon City

Dear Miss or Mister Toby Born Tomorrow, a letter to yet-to-be-born Filipinos

"MANILA, Philippines–By the reckoning of a population expert, the Philippine population will hit 100 million at 12:06 a.m. or thereabouts on Sunday." - 100 millionth Filipino due early Sunday, Philippine Daily Inquirer, July 25, 2014

Dear Miss or Mister Toby Born Tomorrow: 

Sorry. But, be rest assured that things are going to get better in this cunt'ry you'll be born into (and please don't consider your coming-out event tomorrow as your first parental or divine punishment, as it is still coming on Monday in the form of an "address"). I guarantee you that there are still leaders in this cunt'ry, not necessarily residing in Malacañang, who will succeed -- along with the rest of the Filipino people -- in making this cunt'ry a much better place (before or when you end up migrating somewhere else). And right now, or when you start feeling certain noble sentiments, be proud to be Filipino -- as you have no other choice yet, legally. And may you be born a "normal" person, whatever that means. Especially as someone out there is currently giving "abnoy" a bad name -- the emphasis on so-called political correctness during these times notwithstanding. And most likely "it" will get worse on Monday.

So, cheer up after your instinctive and initial "WAAAAAAAAAH!!!" immediately upon extraction from the comfort womb. Who knows, you might end up in Malacañang as the first president of the Philippine Revolutionary Workers Government! And if and when that time arrives, please remember me as (most probably) the very first to write you a letter. And yes, please consider all of this as my decades-early application as your press secretary. (And please don't consider I'd work on a voluntary basis. Otherwise, F!@# you!)

May you have a blessed life ahead, Toby.

Sincerely yours,

Always Proud to be Pinoy

This blog is sponsored by Limitado

phone nos. 09167840522/ 023588753

and S.P.R.A.W.L.-MMA

3rd floor JN Building, 657 EDSA corner Monte De Piedad Street, Barangay Immaculate Concepcion, Cubao, Quezon City

Contact Number:             0910-440-8035      ;             0907-302-0384      ;            0927-703-6912    

Third World Rising (Vol. 1, No. 1)

Back in 1991, I was one of 10 representatives of the National Capital Region in the editorial cartooning competition of that year's National Secondary Schools Press Conference held in Tacloban, Leyte. After more than two decades, here's my first and struggling attempt to resuscitate whatever's left of the cartoonist in me -- by starting a comic strip series of quick sketches and thoughts on whatever takes my fancy from the country where Manny Pacquiao threatens to run for president: ours.  (And yes, this series is entitled "Third World Rising," on a positive note...really.)

Here's my take on the "peculiar way" our president consistently begins his SONAs:

And because the image's rather small (I'll find a way to fix this), the ff. is the fictional dialogue:

PNoy: Eh yung dating pangulo nga...pinapatay yung tagapagtatag ng KKK!

Aide (whispering): Boss, huwag mo na sumbatan si ex-Pres. Aguinaldo, si GMA na lang...

PNoy (whispers back): Pampahaba lang sana ng intro...

Aide: Sige na nga...