Meta octothorp of meh
that moment when
love evanesces into
a mere syllable
or binary numbers
traversing in gigahertz
heartbeats
translated into
electromagnetic pulses
kisses into emoticons
perhaps
there’s a blackhole
even in cyberspace where
we could bend time and space
to awaken ourselves from
this time capsule
this fibre optic-wired
or wifi’d earth
Lockdown Sonnets
1
the silent prosody of my heartbeat
tells me that i lost e’en the iambus
of this sonnet when it suffered defeat
oh me! and oh to my quarantined muse!
but the heart’s unheard music must be penned
somewhere in its core – soul’s sweetest substance
that when it hurts only your smile can mend
only your voice can calm its disturbance
O here it is again – this metaphor
this metahuman kind of love we lost
and found rekindled on an untamed shore
i say this with straight face and fingers crossed
when this pandemic is out of the way
may we still find us as lovers i pray
2
pink supermoon illuminates the sky
tonight i’m taking off my hornèd casque
devour that distant orb with my mind’s eye
or fashion it into a Dali mask
O this persistent existential dread
restraints the discourse of isolation
this pandemic rage blazing in my head
creating a Slavoj Žižek-like fiction
in the meantime, back to genre bending:
the main streets and avenues are empty
my gander and i are philandering
as days go by like a silent movie
i will see you then when the ‘curve is flat’
and earth is greener where i’m standing at
3
how i long to live in a tiny house
on a hill near the sea or the bayou
where i can drink with Po or waltz with Strauss
and pen my bonsaic verses for you
this tiny house will be my hermitage
far from the mad clamour of the city
here be days of halcyon age after age
until i breathe my last and write thirty
when you see me idling in my garden
feeding the birds or basking in the sun
come be with me my heart make it certain
be with me till the wand’ring hour is done
this may just be a minimalist stuff
a tiny house on a hill is enought
4
i woke up somewhere in the polar north
no ice or glacier but an endless sea
and the knee-deep water flows back and forth
every backwash released a memory
half a mile away the wreck of the moon
a monolith and a creature distinct
reconfiguring every afternoon
with a randomized species long extinct
i walked thousands of li to explore the place
strange that this ocean sea never runs deep
it mirrors the cerulean skies and space
and brings me back whene’er i fall asleep
i feel like i’m under a microscope
or God is playing a kaleidoscope
5
the world hides from its invisible foe
to stay into the confines of our home
is the best defense that we can all do
until this pandemic we’ve overcome
to survive in silence or solitude
i tried to imitate art or still life
posing a David with an attitude
doning a Dali in a time of strife
and like a monk in self-isolation
i can keep my distance for a long time
for of what use is imagination
if i can’t wander or write a good rime?
this quarantine do not a prison make
be calm and stay home for humankind’s sake
6
when poems are more potent and powerful
than orisons or pig Latin prayers
wine is a nepenthe to drown my soul
or potion to calm my fears and nightmares
when your love i’ve already lost somehow
and your distant voice i am hearing still
even the language of your thoughtful brow
indecipherable code of your will
why then do i have to cling to mem’ries
and listen to the songs you used to love?
because you’re part of me in many ways
you’re the only one i am thinking o
and when this pandemic ends tomorrow
know that i am here O my sweet sorrow
7
in the looking glass i face my own mask
i’ve been wearing this one since the lockdown
tearing my face off is a dreadful task
but i’ll bear it till you turn me around
on that day i’d peel off my face of gloom
and don my gilded casque with wanton glee
i’d survive an apocalyptic doom
when you’ll come-a-waltzing my heart with me
your smile lingers more than your French perfume
and thus i wear my face of remembrance
trace some stars in the night skies and presume
the outline of your face from a distance
every time i face this sad reality
you are nowhere near but a fantasy
Santiago B. Villafania
Biography – Santiago B. Villafania
Santiago B. Villafania (b. 1971, Pangasinan, Philippines), a bilingual poet who writes in English and in his native language of Pangasinan, is the author of six poetry collections: As I Tango (2016), Ghazalia: Maralus ya Ayat (2013), Bonsaic Verses (2012), Pinabli & Other Poems (2012), Malagilion: Sonnets tan Villanelles (2007), and Balikas na Caboloan (Voices from Caboloan, 2005) published by the National Commission for the Culture and the Arts under its UBOD New Authors Series.
His second book, Malagilion was a finalist in the 2007 National Book Award for Best Book of Poetry; and won the Gawad Komisyon (Tamayo Poetry Prize) for Pangasinan poetry in 2007. He is one of the 11 Outstanding Pangasinenses and recipient of the 1st Asna Award for Arts and Culture (Literature) in 2010.
His works in the vernacular are some of the most representative, if not among the few that comprise the Pangasinan contemporary literary body. Villafania has been published/ anthologized in several countries and some of his poems have been translated into several languages, including Spanish, Italian, Arabic, German and Hindi.
He is a member of the Philippine PEN and currently a commissioner for the Pangasinan Historical and Cultural Commission.