MODULE 2
Philippine Poetry: It's Form, Language, and Speech
Poetry in the Philippines is not different from it other counterparts around the world. In the early 1900s,
Filipino poetry celebrated romanticism, and several poems about love flourished. Eventually, as the
years went on, poetry became moreformalist—the emphasis of the poetry is more on the form and the
language that the poet used, rather than the theme itself. The, modern poetry sprouted, and nowadays,
writers are more adventurous in their craft. Here are some elements of poetry that local writers use in
their poems.
Senses and imagesare used by the writer to describe their impressions of their topic or object of writing.
The writer uses carefully chosen and phrased words to create an imagery that the reader can see
through his or her senses. The kinds of sense impressions in poetry are categorized in mainly the
following:visual imagery(what the writer wants you to see);olfactory imagery(what the writer wants you
to smell);gustatory imagery(what the writer wants you to taste);tactile imagery(what the writer wants
you to feel); andauditory imagery(what the writer wants you to hear).
Diction is another important element in Filipino poetry. In fact, Filipino writers are very careful of the
way they write and the words they use to form their poems. Diction is the denotative and connotative
meaning of the words in a sentence, phrase, paragraph, or poem. Rhyme schemeis the way the authr
arranges words, meters, lines, and stanzas to create a coherent sound when the poem is read out loud.
It may be formal or informal, depending on the way the poem was written by the poet.
Senses, imagery, diction, and rhyme scheme are emphasized in this canonical poem, “Gabu”, one of the
most widely read local poems in English by Carlos Angeles.
Carlos Angeles was born on 25 May 1921 in Tacloban, Leyte. He finished his undergraduate degree in
the University of the Philippines and his work has been included in poetry anthologies in the United
States. His poetry collection,Stun of Jewels,won the Republic Cultural Heritage Award in Literature back
in 1964; he also won the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards in Poetry in the same year. He is an
active member of many Filipino-American press clubs in the US, where he currently resides. His poem,
“Gabu”, is said to be one of the most well-loved Filipino poems written in English.
Gabu
by Carlos Angeles
The battering restlessness of the sea
Insists a tidal fury upon the beach
At Gabu, and its pure consistency
Havocs the wasteland hard within its reach.
Brutal the daylong bashing of its heart
Against the seascape where, for miles around,
Farther than sight itself, the rock-stones part
And drop into the elemental wound.
The waste of centuries is grey and dead
And neutral where the sea has beached its brine,
Where the split salt of its heart lies spread
Among the dark habiliments of Time.
The vital splendor misses. For here
At Gabu where the ageless tide recurs
All things forfeited are most loved and dear.
It is the sea pursues a habit of shores.