photo credit: Aqua Church flickr/Rennett Stowe
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tomsaint/7857278976/in/pool-creative_commons-_free_pictures

This poem was orignally posted in The Hawak-Kamay Haiyan Disaster Relief Project https://www.facebook.com/groups/PoemsForThePhilippines/
https://twitter.com/haiyanpoems

Telepono

— Grald Soda Alop  © (all rights reserved by the author)

 

Kay tagal na isinulat kataga na dapat ,

salitang nais na mabasa nais maiulat ,

sa bawat buga ng sigarilyong nakasamä,

ang pag hingay malalim nakadungaw sa bintanä,

 

ang nais ng pandinig ,mata o pandama,

balitang mula sa iyo kumusta ka na ba,

ang sisiy sa akin hindi sa bagyo,

hindi rin sa dyaryo kundi

sa panahong sinayang ko

 

alumpihit sa upuan hawak ang telepono,

naghihintay ako kahit isang mensahe mo,

sa huli napagtanto ,

sa panahon na ganto,

 

telepono na hawak,

hindi pala bentahe no?

 

kailangan ay dasal kusang gawa ng mga kamay,

mga salita na kusa sa labi dumantay

 

pisi ng pag asa ,

lubid ng paniniwalä,

ang tanging kinapitan sa panahon ng sakunä

 

 

Telephone

(translation) by Su Layug (w/ author’s permission)

This work (translation) is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. (link back when possible)

 

How long it took for the word to be written,

a word I wanted read, I wanted posted,

for each cigarette puff that comes with,

is a deep breath, while staring out the window,

 

what the hearing, sight or feeling wants

is news from you, how you are,

the blame is on me not on the storm,

nor the newspaper but on

time that I wasted

 

unsettled in my chair, holding the phone,

I waited for even just one message from you,

in the end I realized,

In these times,

 

the phone in my hand,

is not of much use, no?

 

what I need is prayer, crafted with my hands,

words that willingly come to my lips

 

lifeline of hope,

rope of faith,

the only thing we hang on to in times of disaster

 

 

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