Oscar Peñaranda

from Seasons by the Bay

Sebastiana's Fire

Sebastiana danced. She did not dance the way a wavelet would upon the ocean's
crest, nor the way a palm stalk would in the breezes, no. She danced without
comparison. She danced her self and the movements took her back and captured her
and spun her into the dance until she disappeared within the dance, and she was
swallowd up by the dance, and she became the dance itself, herself, no more no
less; she danced her self away. She danced unlike anyone or anything and the
clouds gathered in the skies. Yet she did not dance the way a crescent moon
would sail slippery through the tamarind trees, nor the way the gull would glide
across the bay after a storm, nor the way the notes would dance hovering around
the rondallas, no. she danced like herself, alone, she danced without reference,
she danced first and last time like a moment in eternity, inimicable and
irrevokable; she danced herself and the mayas held their silence and hid
themselves in shame, and right there and then the people of Santander and the
surrounding barrios gawked and stared and swayed and sang and clapped, right
there and then, they knew without question, knew without evern asking or
thinking about it, knew just as they, the townspeople, the community, the
baranggay, profound in their simplicity, knew how Pedong the townsmith was born
for the hammer and anvil, knew just as they knew that birds were born for the
singing and eyes for the seeing and flowers for the blooming, knew just as they
knew that Pen-pen was born to be a legend and Totoy born for rememberances even
centuries before his becoming, they knew, the common and humble folk knew that
night, they knew without ever doubting it again, they knew what sebastian's
solace would be in her time of solitude and sorrow and old age should it luckily
come. They knew that Sebastiana was born to dance and all dances of the world
were waiting for her becoming, and that night at the Fiesta all waiting was
over.



from Full Deck (Jokers Playing)

Alaska/Filipino Bunkhouse/Lights Out

Curled up like brown puppies
they would cuddle
alone at nights or early mornings
in their spring-soggy beds
(the veterans would have put
a slab of plywood stolen from the white machinists
under rotting matresses
for their aching and irreplaceable backs)

each retreating under a blanket of
separate dreams
that, during the routine of neverending work,
wrap about them
like stubborn sheets of Alaskan rain and wind

thinking perhaps
of staying and living
the winter there

tired not from the skillful maneuvering
of salmon round the clock
but from
arguing all night
which one
the white woman at
the store stole a
glance at
that day.



The Real Math

Here's a clue
if you take what i did
and to that add my dreams
multiply by what I didn't say
yet did just the same
then subtract what I could have done and
divide by what i said to myself impossible

then you have something
on me

yet after all this
you can find it in your heart
to erase everything
take nothing before and beyond
obliterate all
and gather the answer of who I am
only at that moment

then you can begin
to call me by a
name

if not
let me slide and remain

anonymous



Bayani's Tune

your guitar
leaning on
someone's porch-fence bathed
by the rain that
slowly melts
your dreams away from clenched fists
clutching on...chanting...remembering....

the only dream more
painful is the one left
unpursued
and no-song is better
than a thousand bad ones


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