Francisco R. Albano

I went around
Looking for carnations.
I couldn’t find any.
...

In the beginning
Before beginnings
God said
Let there be light
...

(After Mategna’s “Night”)


Claim this night,
...

His mountains design flight of earth
Rise of self to the top
Where word and silence stop
The inner eye seeing
...

A footnote to Levinas (12January06—25December95)

Unto his image
Unto the image and likeness
...

In memory of Sr. Asuncion C. Martinez, ICM,84
+ July 21,1994
...

On her natal day, September 25,2011

May you always be
God's masterpiece of art
...

Imagine this man,
A priest, no less,
Not believing an angel!
No life comes from
...

All the streets lead to the sacred temple
Built by the town’s flesh and bones,
Its spirit, the blood of life freely given.
The secret is tabernacled here
...

Our truth,
Our way,
Our life,
Be always the Risen Lord.
...

How do a mango tree and a bodhi tree
Become One?
The story is told
Of a typhoon venting fury on the City,
...

It is the idiom of parable
Spells the difference between stranger
And citizen, a language of time here,
Mere curiosity for those passing through.
...

In memoriam FG

It must have been a most difficult decision
Knowing how it keeps us all in being like
...

Regard this
Cuetlaxochitle de pascua
La flor de la Noche Buena
Love offering of Mexico
...

Every event of you that I have known
Returns to make you whole again.
Your death is merely a distant mountain
Imposing but harmless. I am well, Beloved,
...

Who can stay mementos of wind and surf,
The rustle of leaves and sparkle of burns
We once noticed? So many flowers and clouds
Touched, and ideas we designed together?
...

Behold the lilies
And persimmons
In a cyclotron
...

Who showed a grand way to live
And a manner of dying well,
Dare us to greater choices of freedom.
O flesh and blood of our race,
...

(In memory of Rev. Fr. Crispin Offermans, O'Carm, organist, friend of the Filipino people, who died in The Netherlands after many years of mission work in the Philippines.)

1.
...

Once upon a time these hills,
This valley of Malaybalay were barren,
Now we see a garden patiently re-created
By prayer and labor of monks and workers.
...