Jose Marte Abueg
Making fire in the woods
Split mysteries open as
you would bamboo.
Scrape atmospheres
like skin. Of scheme
and state of things,
puncture the middle.
With constant twists
meanings shift and spin, like
a stick between your palms,
heat and friction
grow almost visible, like
patience after time,
until competing
parallels collide
set off primitive smoke,
and strike a new
wonder rising, bursting
open, igniting eyes.
Voyage
Day fragments, fallen
pages—fold together
carefully and cross
the bay, all borders
changeable. Pass confusion
in the mangroves, enter a river
of mornings; hours; night
of shores. Mine the mist for
signs, draw scenes from above
the sky, from silences.
Dip your hand
in hidden waters
solitude
tangerine departures
blue-gray nights
•
In the calm slowly stir
words, unfurl meanings,
launch them carefully—
waves unhurried, ripples quiet
as clouds, flourishing over fog
No obscuring
weeds, no
straying into
vague coves
Voyage now
Slice waters, no maps
Climb masts, call
lands
Name now the coasts, christen
the corals, in moonlit time
own the waters, the waves
Summon,
name
new seas
Be poet
Be ocean
PHOTOS: Leaf overhang from the Editor's Ilocos Album; Crashing Waves by Mark Bagain Schwab