Ped
Xing: Not Just Personal
Pedestrian poetry as a social
commentary
“…Pedestrian
crossings are witnesses to all sorts of people meeting, avoiding, chasing, and
waiting for each other... (where) poets usually hear about their poems being
read by people they will never get to meet. They may be able to relate to these
and will nurture these verses as a part of their lives.”
By
Jesus Baltazar
Contributed to Bulatlat.com
Last
Jan. 30, the Ateneo de Manila University’s Filipino-language student
publication Matanglawin and its Literary Society commemorated the 34th
anniversary of the First Quarter Storm with a forum on protest poetry followed
by a poetry reading.
While
the forum and poetry reading were going on, Ateneo students were selling books
published by their university’s Office of Research and Publications, among
them books by leading protest poet Eman Lacaba, an Atenean who was killed in
Davao as a revolutionary guerrilla in 1976.
Members
of the loose poets’ group Kilometer 64 “tied up” with them and sold copies
of their chapbook entitled “Ped Xing” which was “launched” that same
day.
Who
is Ped Xing?
The
chapbook takes its title from the Ped Xing signs along Taft Avenue in Manila,
where many of Kilometer 64’s members are based (its “founders” are
students of the Philippine Christian University). The Ped Xing signs indicate
areas where pedestrians cross, although they are also said to be the
abbreviation of a Filipino-Chinese businessman’s name.
But
why Ped Xing? In his preface, Kilometer 64 “founder” Rustum Casia says: “I
realize that pedestrian crossings are witnesses to all sorts of people meeting,
avoiding, chasing, and waiting for each other... Pedestrian crossings are
becoming wider and wider...in the sense that you almost can no longer recognize
who you run into on the streets. You may not know that you had just run into
your crush, boyfriends or girlfriends, arch-enemy, classmate.”
Casia
points out that just as we usually run into people we may not recognize on the
streets, “poets usually hear about their poems being read by people they will
never get to meet. They may be able to relate to these and will nurture these
verses as parts of their lives.”
“Usually,”
he adds, “we write poems intended for ourselves, personal poems based on our
experiences. We will let our relatives, crushes, boyfriends or girlfriends,
arch-enemies, classmates and others read them. They would appreciate these and
let others read them. Until one day, you may meet on pedestrian crossings people
who may have read your poems but do not know it was you who wrote them.”
However,
for many of the poets who contributed to the chapbook, the personal is not just
the personal. A good number of the poems here are actually personal takes by the
poets on burning social issues. Which is hardly surprising, since many of them
met in various activities of cause-oriented groups. (The “founders,” for
instance, are organizers of the Anak ng Bayan Youth Party.)
The
poets who submitted political or socially-oriented poems have varying ways of
tackling social issues.
Holistic
Perhaps
the poems in this collection which most holistically reflect the national
situation are “Republika” by Joshua de Luna and “Alay sa Inang Dilubyo”
by Armando Sinaglahi.
“Dito/Basurang
winawalis ang mahihina—/Manggagawa, organisador/Ng maralita sa bundok at
parang,” De Luna thus begins his poem. He then elaborates, and proceeds to
denounce the perpetrators of these atrocities: “Bangag na ang mga tuko/Sa
Malakanyang at Kongreso./They do not see they are evil./They do not hear they
are evil./They do not speak of their evil.”
De
Luna then gives us images of injustice from today’s news as well as the
streets: “Ito ang bayang nabubuhay sa iniksyon,/Sa pawis ng tumutulay sa
iskapolding sa Edsa,/Sa ihi ng dolyar ng caregiver sa Canada,/Sa luha ng batang
Mangyan na pinaslang ang ina,/Sa dugo ng mga binansagang durugista,/Bandido,
terorista.” After which he warns the guardians of the status quo of an
impending revolt by the people.
People’s
revolt is also the stuff of Eurish Tolentino’s “Patay na si Elay,” about a
slain young revolutionary, and Usman Abdurajak Sali’s “Ngunit Buhay pa si
Elias,” his answer to Tolentino’s poem about Elay (chapbook entries are
posted on Kilometer 64’s e-group, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kilometer64/),
in which he reminds the guardians of the status quo that the flames of
revolution will endure so long as injustice thrives.
Sinaglahi
begins with a litany of people’s woes: “Tubig, langis, kuryente, sahod./Ay,
anong bigat na pasakit!” In the following lines he makes an indirect reference
to U.S. imperialism, described by the Establishment as a “close friend” of
the Filipino people: “Nagkulang na kaming lahat sa tulog,/Ginawa pang alipin
ng kaibigan mong matalik.”
“Alay
sa Inang Dilubyo” is largely a denunciation of the present government led by
one whom Sinaglahi describes as “Ina ng mga dilubyo, utol ng impakto,” who
serves only foreign interests: “Oratoryo mo’y salapi ng banyagang bastardo.”
Particulars
Other
poets tackle particular social concerns. Casia in his “Tumanggi ang Inang
Mailagay sa Bodybag ang Anak Niya, Kakalungin na Lang Daw Niya” and Alexander
Martin Remollino in his “Sa Inyong mga Ulo” both tackle apathy to
society’s plight.
Casia
tells the tale of a mother mourning the death of her son in a typhoon tragedy
while in Manila: “Sa isang pamantasang kulay-langit/ang pasukan at labasan,/nagdiriwang
ang mga paang/patungo sa Robinson. “Alas dose. Cut ang klase. Walang pasok.”
Remollino,
meanwhile, tells “moralists” not to ridicule the prostituted, symbolized by
the Biblical Mary Magdalene in his poem, as by their indifference to the larger
social issues they have a part in perpetuating a society where the right to live
with dignity is not respected, a society which inevitably spawns the likes of
Magdalene: “Kayo ng lipunang ito/ang mga magulang ni Magdalena.”
Ayesha
Osop tells of peasants’ dreams in “Lupa ay Buhay,” while in “Munting
Apoy” she pays tribute to the four Anak ng Bayan activists murdered last year
in Maco, Compostela Valley.
Liwayway
Rosales, “Amsoniac,” and Josiah Echano all talk of love amidst struggle.
“In
Praise of Martyrs”
The
chapbook’s final portion is a section dedicated to underground revolutionary
Mayang Algarme, who was killed in Zamboanga in 1999. It contains a short
biographical note on Mayang, written by De Luna, and a few of her poems.
The
tribute to Mayang Algarme is actually the first “shot” of a section
dedicated to revolutionary martyrs, which will be coming out in future chapbooks
by Kilometer 64.
Entitled
“In Praise of Martyrs,” the section takes its title from a poem by Jose
Maria Sison bearing the same title.
Copies
Kilometer
64 sells the 108-page Ped Xing for P30 per copy. The authors invite those
interested to visit their e-group for details. Bulatlat.com
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