Poetry by Ma. Jhayle Meer
“Imagine if this was another country, not nowhere,”
not weaving, not crisis,
not defiled, not child
in house desert,
not dreamlike
not found
truth: your skirt
of fate, your thigh,
a faithless touch
incurring scar
I am afraid to lay
on you the weight
of my own
hand.
“I have a past. But I am here.”
Said my mother once, folding her sadness
Into a tight bun. She hung the photos of her grandparents
Courting in Intramuros, a cochero and Spanish maiden, Indio and salvaged.
How did I get here? Skirt lifted to the knees, ankles crossing
Clear shallow water. I woke on another island
Making music out of violent silence
The dogs hated my arrival, though they cowered and
Lowered their eyes—they thought I was just as broken
Framed and forgotten once I married
Or perhaps reborn? As survived and justified—
Ferried from a set of perils where finally, I am
Muttered into the light, seen plainly for who I am
Languageless and safe: why do I imagine another country? my country
As another? This imagined, dreamlike country
Exists only in my head.
I made you write it down.
Why you left: bored of the task that is upon
Everyone: to escape the poverty of their lives.
To abandon word and tradition, the slow climb
Of generations toward some kind of meaning.
In reality, breaking back to eat supper. Watch:
No one ever truly knew what was up with the
Final supper, it was another image we have let
Organize our lives. Your mother saying, so what?
If we only knew ourselves mirrored in religious figures
At once archaic and real. You will not do it anyway
What was entrusted to you by the family, to wash
The feet of the common folk.
