Via Negativa

         Who are we to know what role
we get to play in life— whether
    hero or foil, or character 
meant to swell a scene or take
         
         the fall for someone else— before
we're unremembered? On the surface of   
    Exekias' amphora, the warrior bends,  
preparing to fall on his own sword.  

         Is it shame from dishonor, every  
battle fought well and bravely but still
    coming in only second best? One of
my college professors said the idea

         of an afterlife that's nothing 
but liminal space (impenetrable 
    fog between here and there, 
with neither joy nor pain) might be

         enough to goad even the stoic 
to some kind of action. But reward  
    is never the kind we expect, nor is 
punishment. The goal could be noble 

        (unless feigned), when putting 
collective interest ahead of individual 
    gain. Why did Ajax want that shield 
so much, and why would that kind 

         of desire be too excessive? 
Today the invocation of his name 
      brings to mind a character 
in the Marvel universe; or a popular 

         powder cleanser whose main
ingredients are calcium and sodium 
      carbonate. Yet Ajax bore Achilles'
body off the battlefield and fought

         for his friend's armor. Down
the centuries, though, it's the beautiful  
     favored ones always striking poses, 
their oiled bodies gleaming in the sun. 

"...it is I myself, come from the wreck,
now telling you my fate."
                 ~ Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book XI


Halkyon the name of this jewel:
          feathered bird born of the open  
                    sea— after the gods, jealous 
as ever, changed her from her flawed 
          mortal counterpart. And halcyon 
                    the windless pause, a bright 
space in the landscape of affliction, in which 
          her widow's plaint might now perhaps 
                    begin to turn into other kinds 
of song— Accuse the ones who hand out 
          sentences with no warrant, no hope of 
                    revocation; with prejudice 
and the appetite for gleeful recrimination. 
          Why should the human aspiration to live 
                    as the more fortunate be 
transgression? To build a heaven of our  
          numbered days, to love and hope  
                    without fear of thunderbolts,  
or war, or separation— to know  
          that fire is our birthright, instead of 
                    something we have to steal. 
          

(In memoriam, Delfin L. Tolentino, Jr.; 1950-2025)

"I want to speak about bodies changed 
into new forms."  
            ~ Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book 1


Reading myth, we learn about small 
oversights that tip the balance, seemingly 
inconsequential flaws that bring both hero 

and demi-god to their knees; how everything 
in excess, even what might be considered good, 
could bring about a downfall. To read 

the signs correctly, the context must be 
complete. For the wrong color of ship 
sail, the father throws himself 

into the sea, its depths both labyrinth 
and monster. The truth lies in the cracks 
of the wall, the crosshairs of the present. 

There, the hapless lovers lie under a mulberry 
tree whose fruits have turned from white to crimson.
And we are blind before we've even torn out our eyes. 

Or we push, with all earnestness, against 
the idea of a pre-ordained fate. If fate 
is real and we have no choice, we want to feel 

that we at least dared raise a voice, shake 
a fist against time's imperium. O, there's no 
mistaking its scythe— Because it sweeps close, 

we too shall sit and read to each other, eat 
and drink around the table with our friends, 
until the heart stops as if of its own accord. 

(La Union, Philippines)


The city of my father's birth
bears the name of the King of Castile 
and Galicia— canonized 419 years after 
his death. I couldn't find any reports 
on miracles he may have performed. But
Ferdinand drove out the Moors and 
expanded these kingdoms for the Church, 
which makes it sound like that kind 
of good work is enough to get you 
sainthood. My father is not a Spaniard, 
and never was nor wanted to become  
a priest. His mother liked to boast 
that she was some part (not pure) 
European— mestiza, india mixed 
with the colonizer's blood. I wonder 
what happened to the house where he 
grew up, windows overlooking streets 
lined with aratiles trees— in summer, 
filled with cotton candy berries, festival 
berries; doves purpling in their shade. 
San Fernando lies in a gold and crystal
casket, in the Cathedral of Seville— 
dry, leathered, but his body 
incorrupt (another test one must pass 
for sainthood). In the northern coastal
town where my father was born, surfers 
and artists who say they're tired 
of big city life have set up 
cafes and studios. Rather than pure 
blood or pedigree, perhaps some 
of them are even there to seek out 
the native in their roots.  

                        No stone
is safe from our probing, no seabed
spared from the sweep 
                      for copper, 
cobalt, nickel, zinc. History abounds 
with pictures of extraction— 
                             Open pits 
tunnelling into the earth, 
ferrous-tinted water  
                     coursing through 
the gorge. Layers of salt crust, lithium 
brine conveyed to evaporation  
                              flats— 
Lithos, the Greek word for stone.
It's light and soft— so soft 
                              that it 
can be cut with a kitchen knife and 
so low in density that it floats 
                                 on water.
It lights up the temples of this world 
and has the power to change 
                            the brain.
Around Hieronymus Bosch's famous
painting, gold-scrolled 
                        letters read:
Master, cut the stone out, fast. Ward off
madness with a scalpel, an amulet, 
                                   a flower bud.