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What strange gods look down on us

What strange prophets foretell

Our suffering sending us these crowns

Of twisted vines and thorns?

 

The sky knits its brows

The sun curses us:

What mother, carrying her child 

Like me, the image 

Of munificence and mercy,

Ignores my supplications?

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DalotavoDaluyong.jpg
Daluyong ng Langit*

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         After the painting, Daluyong, by Antipas Delotavo

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Because I must kneel before

The lowering clouds

I am stunned as the heavens open

And I drown before the waves devour me

What quake or earth-shudder 

Brought the sea rolling into our shores?

 

What drifting continents

Threaten to crush us

What huge boats are these

Neither karakoa nor baroto

Bearing gifts or tinder and long knives

And the smoke of thriving cities?

 

The waves curl and their crests

Break in spindrifts

What storm brews in the boiling

Cauldron beyond our sea?

O gods of our fathers

Source of our ancient wisdom

Forgive us our innocence

Forgive us our future

 

Enlighten us, O Lord of the Stars:

What curse has befallen our race

What heaven has sent us.

 

 

Marne Kilates

20 September 2021

 

*Heaven’s Tsunami

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