Tribute to our poets

Tuesday last week, March 21, was World Poetry Day. It passed without fanfare.

World Poet Day was first conceived by poetry enthusiast Tessa Sweezy Webb and was first observed March 21, 1936 in Ohio, U.S.A.

In 1951 there were 41 countries observing it. On March 21, 1999 the United Nations through its Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization declared the date World Poetry Day for every nation to honor the contribution of its poets.

That would have been the date to honor our foremost poet and also foremost hero, Jose Rizal. But we did not. Instead a foreign country, Czechoslovakia through its ambassador to the Philippines revealed that she translated Rizal's "Mi Ultimo Adios" and recited it herself.

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Most revolutionaries are poets at heart. Rizal was a revolutionary like Mao Tze Tung, Ho Chih Minh and Lenin, to mention a few. As poets they loved freedom which made them rebels. And it is their stirring thoughts that awakened their people. The poetic sensibilities, beautiful and ennobling thoughts were the ones that sustained them in the revolution.

It was the poetry of the late Cris Hofileña, made into a song and aptly named "Guerrilla Serenade" that boosted the morale of our Negrense soldiers in the mountain. The lyrics are so haunting that when sung they brought tears to many veterans. Many of them are gone now.

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Filipinos, by nature, are poetic. Our young people seem to have lost this trait. But we have many epics in Ilonggo.

The "luwa" is a short, two or three stanzas of poems recited during the "velasyon," or night of games mostly among young people to entertain the bereaved family.

There were games and the punishment was for one to recite a "luwa," which usually was a short poem, off color and witty.

There were many Ilongo poets like Flavio Zarragoza Cano or Pedro Monteclaro. No one published or compiled their works.

The University of San Agustin in Iloilo has published literary works of contemporary writers there but have not published the works of Zarragoza and Monteclaro.

There's one outstanding contemporary poet in Iloilo now, practising lawyer, my close friend, Rex Salvilla who visits me at the Negros Press Club when he is in Bacolod having court cases here.

Rex wrote the history of Panay in 100 stanzas. He is a successful practising lawyer.

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Successful professionals, like lawyers, doctors, professors, engineers are steeped in the arts and culture. I cannot imagine an outstanding lawyer or doctor who cannot quote even a line of Shakespeare or Cervantes or Cicero, or the classics.

Must also understand and appreciate music and know Beethoven or Mozart and works of art like that of Reubens or Michalengelo.

Poetry is in their heart. It is in their soul. Poets are born not made. In Latin it is "Poeta nascitur non fit."

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Taiwan honors its poet with its Dragon Boat Festival celebrated on the fifth day of the fifth moon in the lunar calendar every year. They honor poet Ch'u Yuan, the first Chinese poet in history.

Ch'u was vilified and he wrote his sufferings in his "Li Sao" or "Encountering Sorrows." He went to the banks of Mi Lo River and got drowned. The villagers who loved him failed to rescue him.

Then they threw rice balls into the river for the food of Ch'u. But they said the rice balls could also be for the fish so that they would not partake of the flesh of Ch'u Yuan.

We were in Taipeh in a Rotary International Convention some years ago when the Dragon Boat Festival was held. Actually it's boat racing participated in by other countries and it attracts tourists.

It's a tradition that while they are racing they must throw rice balls into the river for the spirit of poet Ch'u Yuan.

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Poetry has been lost to our young generation. They do not know that the songs they sing are but poems put into music. That is why there is rhyme and rhythm.

Songs are poems. Let us honor our foremost Ilongo poets, like former Congressman Augurio Abeto with his, among others "Dalawidaw" and Manuel Villlaluz with his "Yanang Yuhum Mo."

Let us take Abeto's "Dalawidaw." It can hold a candle with other poems made into a song. The beauty is it is in Ilongo.

"Dalawidaw, ikaw kun magambahanon,/ Balanion mong yuhum nga may binalaybay,/ Duhang larawan mo sa dalamguhanon,/ Diwata sa talon kag kataw sa baybay." Translation, "You are dalawidaw (a bird) when you sing,/ Your magnetic smile is a poetry,/ In the dream you have two images,/ A forest fairy and a sea nymph."

Let's jump to the last stanza. "Sadtong kagab-ihon,/ Nga puno sang himaya,/ Sa isang payag kita nagsumpa-anay,/ Didto ta ginpangas ang dili malaya,/ Putling handumanan sang gugmang panganay."

Translation. "That beautiful night,/ A glorious one,/ In a small hut we pledged our love,/ And it was there we planted a living seed,/ A pure remembrance of our first love."

I hope Modi Sa-onoy, son-in-law of Abeto and Bager Villaluz, son of Manuel Villaluz and himself a poet and composer can work out a yearly tribute to our poets.*

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