The Seed of Peace in Default (Part 5)

A bad sign meets Haribon as he tarries in his flight back to the mountains of the Big Isle, after his series of consultations with the bagani warriors of Mandalangan in the northern regions of Mindasilang. He cannot easily believe that Abukay and Perikoy are the ones who meet him on his way and as though a shadow of anxiety inextricably resides in their countenance.

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Tokhang the [uni]verse

Before Buwan ng Wika ends, I published through my social media account “tokhang ang daigdig,” a poem rendered from Alejandro Abadilla’s “ako ang daigdig.” In every illuminating moment of replacing each of Abadilla’s ako with tokhang, the new work gradually forms and reveals itself as something relevant in these dark times, yet conscious of the limits of its being. I leave further reading and thinking up to those who want to dissect the derivative work, which, hopefully, has its own merits. So I can devote enough space to translation. Along the way, what Hans J. Vermeer calls skopos (aim) and/or commission (definition) shifted accordingly, that ended with the translatum (target text), “tokhang the universe.”

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