Poetry&Stuffby
MARNE KILATES
MARNE
S
KRIPTS
from
Antinostalgia & the Tokhang
Rhapsodies
from
Antinostalgia & the Tokhang
Rhapsodies
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
from
Antinostalgia & the Tokhang
Rhapsodies
Poems 2022
Poems 2022
Poems 2022
Poems 2022
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
From Mga Biyahe, Mga Estasyon
From Journeys, Junctions
(a collection of travel poems)
Second-Hand Saints
Back of the sacristy, behind the frayed
Lamé of the purple vestments of our forgotten
Lents, they brood like memory: rejects
From the revised pantheon of our changing
Faith as the parish priest intoned:
Focus on the Son, my brethren, remember,
Even the Mother is only a way to the Son.
And we wonder what had happened
To our grandmothers’ ardent devotions:
The garlands offered, the scapulars worn,
The votive candles burned for the wayward
Child, the grandson venturing out into the city,
Far from the munificence of her trusted saints.
​
2nd Hand Saints,
oil painting by Pancho Villanueva
Or we find them in the antique shop,
Revered for the odor of the past they exude,
By which their values are assessed:
From what hinterland barrio or crumbling visita
Did they come, whose altar did they watch,
Gathering the soot of oil lamps,
What vigil for which fiesta or famine
Did they promise bounty, relief, miracle?
What shoulders bore them in the chanting
Of the Perdon, the dawn processions
Seeking mercy from calamity or retribution?
Tara, Kagurangnan Maria!
Perdon! Perdon! An debotos mo sorogon,
Sa mga sakit agawon! And the hunger ceased,
The grumbling volcano quieted.
Were they imported from Mexico,
Retinue of the Black Nazarene?
How our artisans have improved
Upon the ivory faces of Lebanese virgins!
What wood hides behind the flaking
Plaster or ivory, such naive drapery
Of robes and habits, such whorls
Of cloud embedded with cherub wings!
Back of the sacristy, on the antique shop
Shelf, inside museum vitrines,
They brood, indifferent to our notions
Of grace, history, worship: Found
Objects in our memory of polychrome.
​
November 18, 2008
​
​
​