BISAYA ENGLISH: PROSE AND POEMS EVERY DAY

Nobody like Boy

By JC Nigado

 

Nobody like Boy.

There’s no one

Who likes everybody.

The bottomline is –

He doesn’t show.

Eugenio is Español,

A genius, giving name?

The female is a shrub

Of bright, pied blades

Bush plenty and pretty.

A kind nickname,

Boy pets the young male

In a place of female strong.

A man so kind, grown

To surpass superstars.

Boy’s generosity is legend.

He buys art, four or five –

To size the fund, raising

All aware of the dires 

To call shared memories.

A text, a call or a letter

Is all it takes, friend

And some small days

For Boy to heed in earnest

Without any question.

Nobody like Boy.

There’s no one

Who helps everybody.

Except the bottomline,

He doesn’t know.

Tuesday, 23 August 2016

Tagurabong City, Philippines

There’s a dragonfly off the window

And so it goes, roaming signal

Wondering what went wrong

With Babylon’s roaded rage –

A Colombian killing spree; Davao orders

Steamed in viral, drowning applause.

N.B. Gore Vidal claimed: “it is possible to stop most drug addiction in the United States within a very short period of time.” President Duterte has vowed to stop the same  menace in the Philippines within three to six months.

After rain, Friday morning, 12 August 2016

Tagurabong City, Philippines

VISAYAN ENGLISH: PROSE & POEMS EVERY DAY

There’s a dragonfly off the window

By JC Nigado

There’s a dragonfly off the window

It caught my eyes – Chinese

Spreading its wings at rest;

And shifted my thoughts

Bolivian, in and between sleep

From Indian rain to Morning Sun.

Is this dragonfly forging work?

Hemming around to Seoul on third,

Or is tea finding Ceylon space –

In this Mexico jungle,

Where guilt is felled

By Chile drugs and bullets.

Is this dragonfly Nigerian lost?

Rambling Soviet from the garden

Or the realm of its own –

An old Nicaraguan at play

Trying to fit in ice; dry

Suspects in our uneasy midst.

Dragonflies fly American high

Ugly or clean on thin air.

The unseen seldom matter

As long as it does the hour

And the breath is Parisian –

Where Romans fall to stray.

In style the dragonfly floats

Flitting from Peru to pleasure;

Sans  loch and dragon light –

To dazzle and freeze police

Characters on a Nordic chase

In the land of Anatolia.

In the Malays of dragonflies

The wind blows Greek and doubts

Fearing hearts and minds with Siam

Of sachets, smoke, solvents, syrup

And pills – to please Persian seekers

Of life’s leisure trap.

The trip back flowed silent dead,

Flying alive, both of us thinking

Calling nothing, but oblique looks

That could change the moment

In this tale of two for the taking.

I thanked him for such a night

And wished the driver God luck!

Good luck! he replied, as I graced

A hand to make him feel I was

Not taking it against him at all.

Days rofled on, and I got a call --

Glad he recalled my name on the phone,

But sad to hear him down and mad.

My comrade spied the taxi’s number

And dialed the owner, the breaker’s old man.

The license of the cab and the gun proved

To be a police colonel, around retiring.

The talk of the armed forces came

To cool; but the guy was frantic

Over his father’s nagging, with much ado.

I prayed my comrade to cease

From firing at a word, to plane

The situation. I gave back his money

And took mine, retracing the whole thing.

Thence, smooth facts turned out to roost.

Drive, holdup, friends

It now is, with feelings unheld;

He returned the old phone and wanted

To do the same with the money

That, at last, we took joy in a song.

A month later, Saturday, 26 March 2016

Tagurabong City, Philippines

Posted 6 months and 6 days to the Day

Thursday, 1 September 2016

Five hundred in current, I said

Straight; the rest were old bills

Of the stuff only banks would

Pay until December end.

And my cellphone’s Jurassic!

Perplexed for a moment thin

The driver pressed, and moved

That I change the old for new money,

Anywhere, with anybody -- at once!

Else, he’d give it the gun.

I kept the quiet, knowing

Its might in times like this.

My mind’s presence now him,

To go back the distance, where

The house of a comrade held uncertain.

 

Was he home or was he home?

I shuddered the question,

Hoping not otherwise; but not in vain. 

On the way, we made a deal

To glance each other from whatsit.

I laid my things, and the car strode

To knock, my friend wary at the door.

No questions asked; I requested

A switch for friendship’s sake,

Cash for cash, again, no questions asked.

I cared my comrade, self seeming

Not quite, to be sure, but i

Had a canny feel I was on

The right track to engage

A condition of my nature.

I handed the phone and money, funny

We carried on to where I was going

At first: Cinema One. Off the dot,

A fortune dream was crushed. Failing,

I walked exhausted, yet undefeated.

It’s strange the cabby stayed,

And drove me back to where I hailed him.

Thank Heavens, for small graces; for pits

That closed different people. And for

Being senior strong in the field of the weak.

Drive, holdup, friend (A tale of two for the taking)

By JC Nigado

Drive, holdup, friend

It was to be, when one night

About minutes later than ten

He came to view, seeing

My short signal at the corner.

The street stopped, and I rode

The surprise cab, unsuspecting

What the big hour would bring,

When a couple of chancers crossed

In tentative first assess.

He’s looking good, I combed him

A thirtyish aspect, pushing hard

A smile almost to a grin,

When suddenly the wind blew

And I stammered a thought.

Was it a weary hunch,

A foreboding of Eros to come?

As the wheels swerved fast

From Magallanes, he drew a gun,

Declaring a cold intent on point.

At first flash I knew right --

It’s a policeman’s active arm,

And my head spun, afoot:

Was he legal on the loose?

Suspended or some, what fits?

Then, he gave a curt order:

Cash and cellphone, he briefed.

I assumed ease, amused, much

To his puzzle, brooding brows

And irked wet to a threat.

Hey! he waved the gun,

Without pointing, but angry

All the same; I was resigned

To ride out the storm, brewing

For a night of flirting suspense.