Blue ternate Someone bought a new Orocan He left the light of his tricycle on A dog sits on a road before cars resume Drums A cat Garbage left scattered by dogs The dogs bark at me Where is Chewy? Trixie is standing up
Beware: more dogs
Oh just one Afraid of me but barks at me Cumulus over the horizon Nimbus across the sky Dry everywhere hasn’t rained for a while A child cries He blows his cigarette as he leans his belly on the car’s window She throws the water she drained her mop on To a line of ornamental plants His motorcycle starts without a noise He pressed on his phone while driving Dog and chicken chorus
Was that durian? Must watch those dog shit
Peel off your ref and there’s foam His children, five of them, at the back of his motorcycle I felt water kiss the back of my feet Stench of old sweat on thick sofa White kitten barely alive
Pink hair I thought she sold something I looked and saw nothing No one watching the store Tempted to take a supot of bread But everyone was watching
The bird almost broke my broken eardrum Jeep passed in front Students passed from behind The closer I look the more I want to live Clearer skies I predict less rain ahead Two bags of ice really is one not enough?
Cicadas and a lady with a folded umbrella Is this Narra or Lantican?
A single lampost lights all of us “Los Baños Walks” sound like a good name for a book People talk and so I write When silence sets in what will I write?
The mitsubishi parked means she’s there Balitbitan leaves glow in the dark A bright light calls my pupils When nothing happens in the landscape memories arrive How is the house at Sta. Maria? The cloud moved to show Makiling’s nipples I follow a brown butterfly A guard coughs
Are they missing? Doña Elena is as clean as a street could be Laughter breaks a journey I have taken inside my head Wet brown leaves and white Calachuchi I smell paksiw na isda and remember my father They left a table and two chairs under the tree A cat meows and insects fill the air Dogs bark at me The ladt and her large black dog Lucky barks at me and the lady worries She calls her he follows And I settle A red butterfly follows me
Red wigo I piss These are birds right? Awake at night I hear the train from a far 7 pm A thing at the middle of the road Pitch dark I looked closer A coconut? It moved Hair at the back of my neck stood I see patches of sweat in on my shirt A plane passes by Who would let a car rot on the side of a narrow road?
This is the first draft of a poem written by piecing snippets of observations during a two-hour walk. Streets walked equals stanzas.