ALBERT B. CASUGA: HIS UNFINISHED HOUSE THERE

Thursday, April 26, 2012

HIS UNFINISHED HOUSE THERE

HIS UNFINISHED HOUSE THERE

...But for/ travel, scarcity. I am/ leaving room. I am/ willing away all that/ I do not need.---Hannah Stephenson, “Traveling Light”, The Storialist, 04-25-12

He said there was the old Bulova watch
hanging on the nail behind the door
in his room. It still works. It is yours.

He willed away a relic he did not need,
there was no pawnshop there anyway.
His turned down thumb belied his smile.

There was always his other word for away.
When I go there, I will be there awhile,
and there is no coming back there. None.

He looked away then, pointing to a frame
on the hospital wall, Our unfinished house,
finish it. It is yours. But shelter everyone.

He gave me time when there was none
left to finish his house so he could go there.
There was nothing he needed there. Nothing.

---Albert B. Casuga
04-26-12

This is Poem #26 in my poem-a-day project to celebrate National Poetry Month (April 2012).

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The Blogger's Books

Summer Suns (short story collection with Cirilo F. Bautista, Manila, UST Press, 1962); Narra Poems and Others (poetry collection, San Beda College Publications, Manila, 1968); Still Points (poetry collection, Flores & Associates, Manila, 1972); In a Sparrow's Time (poetry collection, Infocom, Canada, 1990); Songs For My Children (poetry collection, Infocom, Canada, 1996); The Aesthetics of Literature (Literary Theory and Criticism, De La Salle University, Manila, 1972); Editor: Man in Search of Meaning: Literature (Humanities Series, Asia Foundation & DLSU Textbook Committee, Manila, 1970); Man and His Literary Past: The Classical Tradition (Asia Foundation & DLSU Textbook Committee, Manila, 1971); A Theory of Echoes and Other Poems (University of Santo Tomas Publishing House, Manila, 2009). The author's prose and poetry are anthologized in books published in the Philippines, Canada, United States, Australia, and Indonesia.