CAN YOU turn back the hands of time? Only through memory that stands the test of time. [Lay aside French novelist Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, a home reading assignment of long ago.] I’m going down memory lane with snippets of poetry that enliven the mind — and yours too, maybe.
Here’s a favorite stanza from Intimations of Immortality From Recollections of Early Childhood by William Wordsworth (1770-1850):
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
It’s a long poem, and above lines are fragments, so beautiful they reverberate in the heart. Why so memorable? Before taking a ride for home, my hubby Rudy and I would sit on the grass of the Sunken Garden in UP Diliman, and bask on the splendor of the grass. We had watched the movie Splendor in the Grass (1961) starring Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty, and enjoyed it very much.
At the spur of a moment, Rudy and I would come up with one-liners from Walt Whitman as we viewed the renowned sunset over Manila Bay: “Give me the sunset in a cup.” Also by Walt Whitman: “Give me the splendid silent sun,” as we rode in the double decker in the then Dewey, now Roxas Boulevard.
Who is/was the most widely read person you had known? My Nanay Excelsa, youngest sister of my mother Cristeta, would burn the candle late into the night (electric light was most limited then). A very wide reader, the magna cum laude graduate, had advised me to read Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables. In the ‘90s, Rudy and I had watched the Broadway musical adaptation which resonated in our activist’s heart.
I remember Nanay Celsa’s anxiety when her son did not arrive at the appointed time. I was forced to remind her what she had taught us in fourth year high school, a quote from Beawulf:
For if a man be only bold of heart
And his time to die has not yet come
Fate will often spare him thus
And lead him safely out of the hardest strife.
My uncle Col. Greg Rivera, survivor of the Bata-an Death March in World War II, was my favorite partner in family gatherings. We were the last to leave the dinner table in our Rivera Clan Reunion. I was the avid listener as he snatched lines from To a Waterfowl by Wiliam Cullen Bryant:
He who, from zone to zone,
Guides thee in thy flight,
In the long way that I must tread along,
Will lead my steps aright.
From the long stretch of time, I still recall Uncle Greg reciting a stanza from William Blake’s Auguries of Innocence which I myself had discussed with my Eng. Comp. & Literature students:
To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.
Auguries of Innocence? Omens? Portents? The world in a grain of sand — the intermingling of the good and the bad. Beyond the beauty of metaphors, the elegance of language — explore the real world — the plusses and minuses in our Inang Bayan, our beloved Philippines. Inspired and I hope awakened, some students joined me in the demos of the ‘70s, holding the placards: “Marcos! Hitler! Diktador! Tuta!” — the naked truth in our world, in our grain of sand.
Write your own poem or a simple doggerel — words that flesh out your outburst of emotions. Embellish it with poetical thoughts. Or, say it as prosaic as can be as long as the impact is loud and clear. Mine is addressed to the president of our country:
President Duterte,
Stop the EJK!
All deserve a Court day!
EJK (Extra Judicial Killing) brings up vestiges of the Marcos Martial Law regime, a dark era in Philippine history. All human beings are entitled to a day in Court. We live in a just, egalitarian, democratic society. Furthest from being a farce, let us make that a reality. Long live human rights! (Comments to jclagoc@gmail.com)
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Julia Carreon-Lagoc was a columnist of PANAY NEWS for two decades. She pops up with Accents now and then./PN
