The Beloved Idiom | A Reading of Villafania’s ‘Pinabli & other poems’
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In his memoir Elegy for Iris, John Bayley revealed that the young Murdoch wanted her first novel to have “something for everybody.” This was, at least for Bayley, akin to the very spirit of Shakespeare’s corpus. Also, I find this phrase the best way to describe Santiago Villafania’s latest book. For in terms of language, advocacy, and aesthetic vision, Pinabli & other poems, indeed has something in hand for everybody.
“Pinabli” is the Pangasinan word for beloved, perhaps a single beloved, but the reader will find that the direction of this passion disperses. This book extends itself, encompassing the country, the waxing and waning of its literature, blessing the Pangasinan language, embracing languages in their plurality and mutability (for—as a proper banquet—this book is generously attended by the translations of distinguished well-wishers into Filipino, Ilocano, English, Spanish, and Italian), drawing inspiration from Jose Rizal, Sappho and Cirilo Bautista, and singing of many personages, among them Jaime Lucas and Levi Celerio, a soulmate too, and an unnamed rebel poet.
However, in the same way that so many varied adventures lead to the fulfillment of a single quest, all these loves seem to pour into one overarching pinabli: Caboloan, that is, the ancient name of Pangasinan. To oversee this scheme, the poet chose the magnificent Urduja to recur as a figurehead, the heroine and muse.
In her introduction, Dr. Florangel Rosario Braid quoted Dr. Ricardo Nolasco’s remark that Villafania has produced models for succeeding writers. I followed this lead and found, happily, how judicously Villafania orchestrated the commingling of many poetic forms with the different languages, for example, how a Pangasinan tongue-twister assumed the form of a sonnet, how the anlong caught Jose Garcia Villa and Leonard Cohen unawares, how the haiku—in a pas de deux with Pangasinan—yielded to the cummings-type lyric that sought to cut in.
I can imagine how a reader can find fault in the scatter of this mass of poems. In my view, what the collection lost in terms of cohesion and elegance, it gains in sweep and ambition. Villafania needs such vision and range to translate poetic forms across the shores of cultures. He must willingly import and export these forms and languages, wholesale, so to speak, in order to assure the continuity of Pangasinan literature. If he wishes increase the repertoire of this particular literature, he must endow it with new methods of drawing breath.
The present collection proves Villafania equal to the challenge he set for himself.
Something in this book for everybody, I said, but what’s in it for me? There is this one poem, and I had the good fortune of hearing the poet read it himself, his delivery almost as sombre as his black shirt. Dalityapi sa Huling Paglalakbay speaks of the final journey of the cattle-caravans (those lovely cow-drawn shops laden with brooms, clay pots, toys, and many other products from the provinces) toward the city that decided to shun them. Villafania leads with this stanza:
ang mga bumabaroy ng Caboloan
ilang salinlahi din silang naghari
sa mga daan at lansangan upang sundan
ang bakas ng kanilang mga ninuno
at haraya ng lalawigang pinagmulan
Here is the penultimate stanza of the second movement:
sa ngalan ng ng paglago at pagbabago
ngayon ay mga dumi sila sa paningin
sa mga lansangang ipinagbabawal nang apakan
sa mga bayang pilit iniluluwa
ang kanilang kaluluwa pabalik sa silangan
Source : http://www.manilatimes.net/index.php/sunday-times/the-sunday-times-magazines/22332-the-beloved-idiom
In his memoir Elegy for Iris, John Bayley revealed that the young Murdoch wanted her first novel to have “something for everybody.” This was, at least for Bayley, akin to the very spirit of Shakespeare’s corpus. Also, I find this phrase the best way to describe Santiago Villafania’s latest book. For in terms of language, advocacy, and aesthetic vision, Pinabli & other poems, indeed has something in hand for everybody.
“Pinabli” is the Pangasinan word for beloved, perhaps a single beloved, but the reader will find that the direction of this passion disperses. This book extends itself, encompassing the country, the waxing and waning of its literature, blessing the Pangasinan language, embracing languages in their plurality and mutability (for—as a proper banquet—this book is generously attended by the translations of distinguished well-wishers into Filipino, Ilocano, English, Spanish, and Italian), drawing inspiration from Jose Rizal, Sappho and Cirilo Bautista, and singing of many personages, among them Jaime Lucas and Levi Celerio, a soulmate too, and an unnamed rebel poet.
However, in the same way that so many varied adventures lead to the fulfillment of a single quest, all these loves seem to pour into one overarching pinabli: Caboloan, that is, the ancient name of Pangasinan. To oversee this scheme, the poet chose the magnificent Urduja to recur as a figurehead, the heroine and muse.
In her introduction, Dr. Florangel Rosario Braid quoted Dr. Ricardo Nolasco’s remark that Villafania has produced models for succeeding writers. I followed this lead and found, happily, how judicously Villafania orchestrated the commingling of many poetic forms with the different languages, for example, how a Pangasinan tongue-twister assumed the form of a sonnet, how the anlong caught Jose Garcia Villa and Leonard Cohen unawares, how the haiku—in a pas de deux with Pangasinan—yielded to the cummings-type lyric that sought to cut in.
I can imagine how a reader can find fault in the scatter of this mass of poems. In my view, what the collection lost in terms of cohesion and elegance, it gains in sweep and ambition. Villafania needs such vision and range to translate poetic forms across the shores of cultures. He must willingly import and export these forms and languages, wholesale, so to speak, in order to assure the continuity of Pangasinan literature. If he wishes increase the repertoire of this particular literature, he must endow it with new methods of drawing breath.
The present collection proves Villafania equal to the challenge he set for himself.
Something in this book for everybody, I said, but what’s in it for me? There is this one poem, and I had the good fortune of hearing the poet read it himself, his delivery almost as sombre as his black shirt. Dalityapi sa Huling Paglalakbay speaks of the final journey of the cattle-caravans (those lovely cow-drawn shops laden with brooms, clay pots, toys, and many other products from the provinces) toward the city that decided to shun them. Villafania leads with this stanza:
ang mga bumabaroy ng Caboloan
ilang salinlahi din silang naghari
sa mga daan at lansangan upang sundan
ang bakas ng kanilang mga ninuno
at haraya ng lalawigang pinagmulan
Here is the penultimate stanza of the second movement:
sa ngalan ng ng paglago at pagbabago
ngayon ay mga dumi sila sa paningin
sa mga lansangang ipinagbabawal nang apakan
sa mga bayang pilit iniluluwa
ang kanilang kaluluwa pabalik sa silangan
Source : http://www.manilatimes.net/index.php/sunday-times/the-sunday-times-magazines/22332-the-beloved-idiom
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