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The Book of Orag

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They were so powerful they could

Exile a word from the language.

 

It simply didn’t mean that a boar

Was snorting to have sex,

 

Or by the same token, a datu’s or a sultan’s

Extraordinary prowess to impregnate,

 

Maybe maintain a harem, emulating

His Ottoman betters, no matter

 

How Sulu or Ibalon might have been 

So far from the center of Majapahit.

 

It was so evil, the friars said, they made it

Into a name for the Devil himself.

 

And so they cast orag to the underworld

And none was ever so bold to utter it. 

 

There it lurked with its near-relatives

The anitos and bailanas, and surely

 

The cimarrones and bandidos,

Later the filibusteros and insurrectos,

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 “The word was used to describe the great men who lead our ancient tribes. They were brave men, they were men of grit who protected their people, their land and their possessions…”

 

                                                                   —Abdon Balde Jr.

Because for us—Bikolanos 

Who drink firewater and eat fire—

 

Lambanog and siling labuyo—

It never could be cowed or browbeaten.

 

We kept on using and saying it,

Rolling it under our tongues, 

 

Magically like an incantation, 

Tenderly like an endearment, 

 

Crisply like an expletive. Because 

the Bikol, and we daresay, the Filipino, 

 

Simply has it. Plain old fire in the belly.

Asim. Apog. Astig. Ulo na lang dumudura pa!

 

Orag is the “It.” Oragon is he or she

Who has “It,” the whole gamut—

 

From chutzpah to animus to zing—

No white magic could banish the thing.

 

 

Marne Kilates

11 June 2012; Rev. 5 July 2019

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No banishment from the dictionary

Could kill the word, and likewise without

 

Ever suspecting it, the Noli and theFili,

Ang Dapat Malamang ng mga Tagalog

 

And the Kartilya—they all had it! 

The Thomasites didn’t know the word

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But later, Lukban and Belarmino used it.

The Imperial Japs ignored it, to the boon

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Of the Guerrillas and the Huks, who had it.

Does the CIA know about it? Well, they 

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Study languages. Old people still forbid

The young to say it, putting a finger to their lips.

 

But it’s got the talent of the taong-lipod 

And the tupung-tupung. It’s invisible, it can 

 

Shape-shift, it’s beside you and you don’t know it.

In fact, even if the newest edition of Vicassan

 

And the UP Diksiyonaryong Filipino,

Still don’t list it—both have it!

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Orag, the name of the Fallen Angel,

Was in everyone and everything that

 

Didn’t belong to the fold. But colonization 

Faded, and though Rizal and the Propagandistas,

 

Bonifacio, Jacinto, and the Katipuneros

Never suspected it, they had it!

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