*The reader must first of all forgive the fact that there will be no biographical notes here because this paper holds onto the idea that the text captures the soul of its writer.
Any reading of Jose F. Lacaba’s work, or any master for that matter, always gives the sense of effortless creativity. And perhaps that is the magic of Lacaba’s poetry: for the reader to be made aware of conflicts, absurdities, and great truths in the gentlest form of rhetoric.
The Filipino mind is a highly inhibited perspective from which both true introspection and observation, in a more open manner, are nearly impossible. But the Lacaba’s craft can easily circumvent what C.S. Lewis calls “watchful dragons” within the human mind which prevent it from paying attention to larger questions. And whereas post-modernity demands and coerces our attention by bombarding us with vulgar enigmas, the subtlety of the poet in question makes no bones about revealing his concern for the reader—the effect of Lacaba’s work is very much akin to the truly paternalistic gestures of old.
In his anthology Kung Baga sa Bigas (University of the Philippines Press, 2002), Lacaba makes the overall dialectics of life simpler for everyone. And no, what occurs is not a trivialization of the world, but rather, a summarization of it.
“Lahat ng hindi ko kailangang malaman,
natutunan ko sa pelikulang For Adults Only”
Marumi and pulitiko, pero malinis ang budhi
ng puta.
Ipokrito ang pari, pero may ginintuang puso
ang puta.
Nagpapaaral ng kapatid na magpapari
ang puta.
Namumutiktik sa putang ina at anak ng puta ang malaswang bibig
ng puta.
Nalululong sa droga ang anak
ng puta.
Ayaw ng putang ina na ang anak niyang babae’y masadlak
sa pagpuputa.
Ang unang tikim sa luto ng Diyos ay ipinapatikim
ng puta.
Bukas ang simbahan kahit madaling-araw tuwing magdadasal
ang puta.
Nagbubulungan ang mga manang na nakakasalubong
ng puta.
Ginahasa ng tiyuhin ang puta kaya siya
nagputa.
Tulak ng kahirapan kung kaya nagputa
ang puta.
Hindi nagpapahalik sa labi
ang puta.
Kapwa puta ang mga kabarkada
ng puta.
Magandang lalaki ang nag-aalay ng tapat na pag-ibig
sa puta.
Masungit na ina ng magandang lalaki ang nag-aalok ng pera
para lumayo
ang puta.
Kung binabaril ang bidang lalaki, yumayakap at tinatamaan
ang puta.
Tanging kamatayan ang tutubos at magpapatawad sa kaputahan
ng puta.
Sigaw ng puta: Pare-pareho naman tayong
puta!
(Kung Baga sa Bigas, pp. 100-101)
Taken at its didactic value, this poem preaches the biblical lesson of taking the beam out of one’s eye before taking the speck from your neighbor’s. Yet even with this prudent layer of intention is the undeniable beauty of the technique employed. By repeatedly using the word ‘puta’ in every instance there is a looming feel of reverse psychology as it is told by a parent. If the lesson really were to teach a child not to be prejudiced with the people he meets then the method here is to show the youngster the fact that every human being has a little wrong in them, and that no one is in any real position to pass judgment on anyone else. The title already bespeaks a hard lesson to be learned and the device chosen for the task—a for-adults-only movie—only means that even people advance in years still find it difficult to accept and share the lesson offered since they have to keep it to their own demographic. Added to this is the formulaic crescendo of a slapstick Filipino love-story-cum-action film, which in the end slams into a counterpoint by a fresh insight seldom and often never heard, cry of the nubile prostitute.
This poem addresses the whole of a society that refuses to be judged but is so eager to give it. This seems most poignant in the line which says that only death can redeem the whore’s being a whore.
Why is it that we fail to forget the dignity of every person?
Lacaba’s reply is illustrated in the lines which depict the old devotees in church who murmur to each other whenever they run into the prostitute. People—who believe they are of higher value than others—hold so much to the visual and ethereal rites of religion, still require some concrete proof of their cheap ‘holiness.’ And this proof they find in the local whore. They may not see it but they need people like whores and other community ‘lowlifes’ to justify themselves in their unproductive version of good living, which is a great shame for Christianity.
And if Lacaba seems gifted with subtly putting great debates out in the open, he also possesses that eerie skill of getting into the reader’s head, so to speak, and there wreak some artistic havoc, which eventually leads to an ‘epiphany’ in the Joycean sense of the word.
“Pusa sa kalsada”
Ang abuhing pusa sa harap ng bahay
ay pusa naming tatlong araw na yatang
nawawala. Ngayon, eto siya, kampanteng
nakahilata sa kalsada, halatang
patay. Kung sino ang yumari at sino
ang nag-iwan dito ay hindi ko alam.
Ang alam ko’y kawatan ang aming pusa,
nagbubungkal gabi-gabi sa kusina
ng kung sinu-sino, hindi lang sa amin.
Kagabi pang ako’y nakakatulog na,
may naamoy akong parang naagnas,
pero dahil gabi’y hindi ko pinansin.
Madaling-araw nang ako’y magising. Nang
buksan ko ang bintana, tumambad agad
ang patay na pusa sa harap ng bahay
Isang aleng napaaga rin ng gising
ang nagdaan, nagtakip ng ilong, diring-
diri. Tinitigan ako nang masama.
Tiim-bagang akong nagpunta sa likod-
bahay, naghukay nang malalim. Pagkatapos,
dala ang pala, dustpan, posporo, diyaryo,
at samboteng gaas, pumasakalye ako.
Parang pawisan ang katawan ng pusa,
walang balahibo ang bundat na tiyan.
Pinaliguan ko ng gaas ang bangkay,
kinumutan ng diyaryo, at sinindihan
ang kumot—na agad nagliyab, nanliit.
Umanyong gigising ang pusa; umunat
ang katawan nito, tumaas ang paa,
parang naghihikab lang, nag-iinat—at
bumuka ang bibig, pumutok ang puwit,
parang bigas na biglang bumuhos ang mga
uod, puting-puti, maliit, malikot,
namamaluktot sa kalye, mga anak ng
apoy, nilalamon ng gutom na apoy.
Kinilabutan ang ilang nagdaraan.
Tinanggap ng dustpan ang tulak ng pala.
Hindi pa nagkasya ang ulo, sumuka
uli ng uod na nagkikisay.
Patakbo kong dinala sa naghihintay
na hukay ang pusang sunog, tinabunan ko
ang butas, pinukpok ng pala ang lupa.
Ni wala nga palang pangalan ang pusa
amin, hindi nabigyan. Balik sa kalye,
kunin ang bote ng gaas.
Uod, uod.
Hindi ako makakapag-almusal nito.
(Kung Baga sa Bigas, pp. 9-10)
Apart from his fine handling of imagery in this poem, Lacaba is also displaying skill in a poetic form of flash fiction. Just like Richard Brautigan’s The Scarlatti Tilt, the poem above exhibits the same elements that a normal short story requires. It begins with the problem of a kitchen-raiding cat which upsets everyone in the neighborhood, and so there are already characters, a setting, and a conflict. The climax is of course when someone really gets pissed off with the feline and decides to take matters into his or her own hands. And the descending action unfolds with the burning and burial of the cat by its owner. But even then, since it is fiction in poetry, a question inevitably lingers: was the act of killing the animal justifiable?
The brutal realism of the poem seems to give character to what truly is vintage Lacaba, which is basically an empirical perspective of truth. Though realism may not appeal to some, and more specifically to the age of today, Jose ‘Pete’ Lacaba gives not only art worthwhile studying and viewing, but a cultural heirloom for generations to come.
No comments:
Post a Comment