[su Yaon Sa Tore] / (The Ones In The Tower) Poem by Jaime Jesus Borlagdan

Su yaon sa tore
dakol an aram
manungod sa kinaban
na saindang pigdudukuan:
an gabos daa tarakod
sa sarong banal na balanse
langit kontra daga o dagat
mga eternal na kontrapeso
sa planadong pisaran
matematikang pigbilang an kawaran,
katotoohan, pinatagas sa altar na salming
mga gwapong kabayong nagrarabas
sa de pakpak na hurop-hurop.
Dai man mababasol ta hali mananggad sa itaas
an kinaban talimon kan perlas
daing tipak, daing rungas.

Su mga nakahadok sa daga ugaring
laen man an pigtataram.
Dai daa ninda aram
kun ano an kinaban.
An aram sana ninda
iyo an pagmate
kan pagtukad buda pagbulusok
kan dalan.
Mga daing herak na bulod
ki matarom na gapo buda basud
na pigkakamangan kan nabulot
nindang magabat na baktot.

Abril 17,2007. Karangahan.


English:

The ones in the tower
Know a lot
About the world
Which they stoop upon:
Everything they say is connected
To a holy balance
Heaven against earth or sea
Eternal weights
In a pre-conceived scale
A mathematics of counting the emptiness
Truth, immobilized in a glass altar
Beautiful horses galloping
On winged meditation.
We can’t blame them for from the top
The earth really is a sphere of a pearl
Without a crack, without a scratch.

Those who are pressed to the ground through
Allegedly don’t know
What the world is.
The only thing they know of
Is the feeling
Of the climbing and the falling
Of the path.
Merciless hills
Of sharp rocks and sand
Where their stuck heavy load
Crawls.