Strife Poem by Elmer Romulo Valdez

Vividly, I see you beyond me,
Face burnt by sun and wind;
Offering a reluctant smile,
And jagged, reddened teeth.

You'll never grasp the reasons:
Why men of influence and power,
Smother your fundamental rights,
And rewrite your own history.

Why giant motors and machines,
Spoil your natural wonders,
Obliterate your ancestral abodes,
And desecrate the graveyards.

Why your life-blood be regulated,
And secured by steel and concrete,
Totally shackled and immobilized,
Your mighty river is now chained.

You cannot match the strength,
And cannot fathom the insanity;
Why so much has to be altered,
In the quest for development.