THE LITERATURE OF THE PHILIPPINES' MARTIAL LAW

The Philippines just held its elections, electing a President who's been described as possessing dictatorial tendencies, and the son of Ferdinand Marcos being a close second in the Vice Presidential race (in the Philippines the races for President and Vice President are conducted individually/separately).  This makes all the more timely the following list (the link is a Facebook link):

A Working List of Martial Law Literature


About my inclusion, I said on Facebook:

I AM VERY PROUD TO BE PART OF THIS LIST. In poetry I have only one loyalty and it's not to a particular community, country, political bent or trends concocted within the so-called literary industrial complex. Having said that, it would have been ridiculous for a writer of my age and roots not to be on this list. I actually have an unpublished short story manuscript on this theme -- I say that only to stress that this poet of Beauty does not believe she lives in a vacuum. I am very proud to be on this list.

I represent through the following poems and short stories -- and am proud to represent:

POEMS:
“List(ing) Poem: Towards the New Filipino Society” by Eileen Tabios  (1)

“My City of Baguio” by Eileen Tabios  (2 and 3)

“The Rebel’s Son” by Eileen Tabios  (4)

“What Can A Daughter Say?” by Eileen Tabios (2 and 3)

SHORT STORIES:
“Negros” by Eileen R. Tabios

“Force Majeure” by Eileen Tabios

“The Man in a White Suit” by Eileen Tabios

“Redeeming Memory” by Eileen Tabios

*****

(1) Featured in I TAKE THEE, ENGLISH, FOR MY BELOVED
(2) Featured in THE THORN ROSARY
(3) Featured in The Light Sang As It Left Your Eyes: Our Autobiography
(4) Featured in Beyond Life Sentences

RE. A SHORT STORY COLLECTION

The considerations over how to order a short story collection overlap with those over ordering a poetry collection. But one difference I’ve noticed is the tension between thematic content and literary quality.

Of course all of the stories are supposed to be good, otherwise they shouldn’t be part of the intended book. But in looking at a group of stories (or group of poems), one always feels that perhaps this particular one is better than another. And one always wants to lead with the best. ("Best", of course, is not just subjective but can be defined by other parameters besides quality, like its effectiveness as a manifestation of the book's overall theme...)

This morning, I moved a story that was originally fourth in my intended line-up to be the second story. I did so because I thought it offered a perspective on the theme (aftermath of the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship) that contrasted more with the first story than did the story I originally intended to be second.

I also made the change because of length: the originally intended first and second short stories are both long; the new second story, by being short, inserts (I thought) some good breathing space. While this consideration may also rear itself up in ordering a poetry collection, there is a difference due to scale, thus, pace. Short stories are usually longer than poems—it seems to me that if a particular poem doesn’t work for a reader, the reader can move forward quickly to the next poem. For prose, if it doesn’t work, the reader might skip moving on to the next piece but instead just give up on the book or defer its reading to a later time (which has been my reading experience).

Here's what the dining table looked like this morning as I muttered these thoughts over the manuscript... each individual story was stapled together; for me, it helped to physically move the stories about as I considered their order for the book ... 

... as I turned my attention away from poetry to fiction…

MINDFULLY IS A VERB

There are so much wonder and wonderful insights in Allen Bramhall's latest over at Mandala Web (a project that's developing so beautifully): "Proust and James, Mindfully."

One of my first reactions was that it's what can emanate from deep reading, and that's joyful to behold.

In fact, I found in there the key to unlocking how I might develop the needed last story for The Dictator's Aftermath -- thank you, mindful Allen!

Anyway, do your day and yourself a favor and GO READ THIS.  Mindfulness--a ravishing, albeit at times ravished, thing ...

THE DICTATOR'S AFTERMATH (WORKING NOTES)

Prose and Poetry -- such different worlds. I've been working on essays and short stories lately -- such a different (for me, much slower) pace...  

The Dictator's Aftermath is a short story manuscript-in-progress. Did some editing tonight. 'Twas a collection of 14 stories. Eliminated four. Reorganized structure to include Afterword that would include a flawed story that I’d otherwise eliminate. Realized from new structure the need for one new short story. As recently as a year ago, I would have found this process painful. But, no, it’s just the territory…

One story was written “after" Plato’s “The Symposium." My story was written last century and I insert the link so I can return to Plato's tale which I've forgotten. I'm curious now as to what it has to do with my story about a protagonist's mother forever drunk on tapey (Filipino rice wine) to alleviate the boredom of counting dust motes in a sleepy village where nothing much happens except tsismis...

Some stories begin with epigraphs (which I may or may not keep).  Here are all of the epigraphs—whether they're retained or not, they reveal something about the nature of the collection:

 "It takes tenderness to perceive"

—from Poem No. 37 by Jose Garcia Villa

"Who knows what happens to the prayers we so fervently believed in as children?"

—from "PLANET WAVES" by Eric Gamalinda

"This is the moment in which I am living now  teleology more than denouement, neither exorcisms nor culmination."

—from "IDENTIFICATIONS" by Clinton Palanca

The recitation of retreats

is written in the wagon ruts

that disappear into the brush toward the Salton Sea.

An ellipsis follows

where the nodding skald has lost the threat

in his tale of endless brutality.

The army regrouped. It was not a defeat.

The prisoners were led away.

The wind set up a howl of mourning.

On the stark blue slate of sky

frail cirrus inscribe

all history,

all old lies.

—from "West of Brawley" by Douglas Spangle

". . . Exile from the land of one's childhood can sometimes prove the most certain way home. . . . Lost . . . is the tactile immediacy of the past, the physical evidence of experience.  Gained is the costly freedom to remember, to turn place and time over and over in the imagination, all the while knowing that no one story can explain the past."

—John Burnham Schwartz

"our youth is where the only gods we ever created live"

—Jonathan Carroll

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Work. That's how I roll: work.  And so, onward...