Somewhere in Plummer’s Hollow,
a man sits clipping his nails
this morning. There
is snowfall, light as down.
Much further east, uncommon frost
recedes into the hills of Atok, Benguet,
studding the heads of cabbages,
stalks of wild grass, flowers.
Wasn’t it there
conquistadors sought
the fabled orange tree that flew or fell
from El Dorado? Under the earth
are jars of ore and silver.
Little flotillas of creased paper
go down the creek. Sometimes
it seems the past might never
have happened. But even here
the ends of threads are gathered;
the lines on the horizon draw
this world into the other one.
And back and forth the shuttle goes.
—Luisa A. Igloria
01.07.2011
In response to today’s Morning Porch entry. Atok, Benguet is a mountainous municipality in western Luzon northeast of Baguio City, where Luisa grew up. Due to the elevation, occasional frosts occur, with devastating effects on vegetable growers.
OTHER POSTS IN THE SERIES
- Stay
- “Findings”: the missing Morning Porch poems
- Two more Morning Porch poems from Luisa Igloria and a comment on free culture
- What Leaf
- With winter’s gift of unimpeded sight,
- Aubade, with Feathers
- Scherenschnitte
- Solstice
- Heart and Shadow
- “The sudden spasm of wings”
- “Before sight, sound—“
- Four Morning Porch poems
- “Up and down the street, the neighbors…”
- Memento Mori
- “The streets are lined with garbage bins…”
- “Soon the old year must join…”
- Speaking of __
- Postcard
- Wake
- Despedida de Soltera
- Filament
- “Paired or unpaired, all in the world…”
- Graupel
- Auguries
- Closer
- Menage
- Preludium
- Instructions
- Consonance
- Rosary
- Forager
- Photogram
- [poem temporarily hidden by author]
- Landscape, With Darkness and Hare
- Ghazal of the Dark Water
- Landscape, with Cardinal and Earring
- Intention
- Vertices
- One Day, That Room
- Landscape, with Small Flakes and Far-off Bandoneón
- Sentence
- Spun
- Intercession
- Recurrence
- Landscape, with an End and a Beginning
- Waking
- Thaw
- Spell
- Dim Sun, Dim Sum
- Vanishing Point
- Monday Landscape, with Clocks Borrowed from Dali
- “Last night’s wet snow…”
- Ephemera
- Landscape, with Water Fountain, Small Clouds and Endless Lyric
- What She Wants
- Landscape, with Mockingbird and Ripe Figs
- Letter to Arrythmia
- Love Poem with Skull and Candy Valentines
- Letter to Affliction
- Letter to Levity
- Thaw
- Letter to Rubbermaid and Tupperware
- Letter to Spam
- Ellipsis
- Nave
- Little Waking Song
- Imminence
- Letter to Water
- Letter to Green
- Meditation on a Seam
- No Two
- Ghazal of Burgeoning Things
- Deseo
- Petition for Something Other than White
- Letter to the Hungry Ghosts
Luisa’s poems are incredibly lovely – I feel as though I am reading in Spanish – without the struggle of translation. I hope you/she publish this marvelous dialogue in hard copy. Wishing you both a
Happy and Creative New Year!
Thanks, Patricia! So glad you’re enjoying the series.
Thank you for your kind words, Patricia. I’m just grateful that the poems come! Happy New Year to you too.
*
On the reference to Atok — My eldest daughter alerted me to some of the photos that Baguio photographer Ompong Tan took on Jan 06 2011, of frost-covered produce and fields– according to friends in the Baguio-Benguet area, there have been record lows in temperature, such as have never really been seen before.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=481772776595&set=a.481772551595.264514.669741595