Poems of Jean Rojas

The sun went down

Bitterly over the horizon

A passive moon

Rose from a crimson cloud

Darkness devoured light

Denying the sight

To decipher the right,

From the left

And the wrong

Can easily pass

For bright,

Our sorrows

Have just begun

It’s fight

 

We are all getting hungry

Not just for food

But for the good,

We can no longer

Distinguish the false

From the truth

They blend and mix

And ram it down

Our throats like a fix….

A drug induced euphoria

To forget the real score

But we just crave, all the more…

to learn

to seek justice

for a better future

for a better place

to live….

 

Where have all

Our heroes gone?

 Have we lost the

Taste for values…?

And our courage

Desert us

When we needed

It the most…

 

Shall we let them

Do this to us?

Turn us into

Willing fools who

Believe every lie

Served upon us

On a silver platter?

Will we let them get

Away with it?

those little people

with such big power

Sitting there,

High above their thrones…

They have raped our senses

And belittled our intelligence

If we let them stay now,

They might never leave…

And then, we will wallow

In our grief.

 

Tears…..

Welling in our eyes

Are daggers to the heart

Pointing and piercing

A perfect aim

We must resist

We must insist

And let the little people

In the big offices

Go tumbling down…..

The pain is great

When the stomach grumbles

But greater still the shame

When the world rumbles

 

That our country is in shambles

Our reputation is in mumbles

Let’s go back to the preamble…

We, the Filipino people…

We no longer have sovereignty..

We were stripped of our dignity

Led  by leaders with false humility

False prophets of duplicity……

 

Every Filipino,wake up!

Rise up, for this unfortunate nation……

 

14 November, 2005

 

The beautiful and famous Philippine sunset.....

 

I heard a call
an echo towards the sun,
come forth my heart
thy wounds lay restless,
narrow seeds
upright among distorted rainbows
into darken storms do shroud
the forsaken road
alone and far away
a dream in death despair
the value of true love
the wisdom of its feel
has lost its touch
time's eager hands did block

I'll never know
the kiss of fever pitch
thy cheeks best stole
the song no lyric
ever wore

For: WALLACE REID
18 August, 1997

I speak your name
I touch you
from the cold you emerge
have I known you?
has it come to the point
where hearts must bleed
before they sing?
I can not believe
that I have loved you
for so long
and yet not see
what went wrong along the way
that the door between us
just snapped shut

have you suffered
cruelties that I
did not forsee?
and with a heavy load
that wanted to unburden itself
I cried....
long ago and far away
I seem to recall
you cradled me in your arms
the feeling stuck
to always haunt my mind
I ache with longing
for your touch
when was it born
this bitterness in our hearts?
why have we nursed it deep within
only to find shadows
climbing on our backs
clawing their way into the
very essence of our togetherness
somehow I believe
you must have loved me too
but that is gone now
and everything is through.....

for: VIRGINIA SALCEDO ROJAS
1990