To A People's Warrior Returning To Battle Poem by Cheryl L. DaytecYañgot

The clarion call sounded; You are not ours
Despair’s hope owns you. You stand before us
Carrying all you own in a battered backpack
Well-worn clothes and your dream that the cries
Of penury in the masses’ favela will sojourn
The yield of peasants’ sweat will fill their plate
Mothers in an infinite line of mothers will stop
Burying sons and daughters in an eternal line
Of sons and daughters who perished while passing
Through the less-traveled road you keep treading
With resolute gait, overriding humps and thorns
Our solace is the road you took is the right one
No one gets lost; the road is light to dark paths

You leave us clinging to the dreams you take
For our desperate hopes mirror your own
Off to the far edge you go beyond this line
Across the landscape, hidden by dark clouds
Or, at times, by blinding rays of sinister light
With eagerness, there wait promise of safety
Blending artlessly with the threat of danger,
like a dropp of rain in a barrel of oil
Hope claimed you; your death is its sorrow
But a mother’s fear for your life is so heavy
That the promise of survival seems light in it
Who knows? You chose a life of uncertainty
For aspirations as certain as the light of day

Our words stammer through unsaid goodbyes
Later, we will stand on the veranda and wave
Till your figure disappears with the dusty road
For the moment let me hold you tight, so tight
It may be our last touch, before your final war.


For K. Ole

- 26 October 2006-