Karina Lagdameo-Santillan

ARTIST’S PROFILE I first met Junyee when I was a student at the University of the Philippines in the early seventies. Together with some artist friends, we would later visit him when he began living in the campus of UP,…

POETRY             <A Prelude> In the early days of the Co-vid 19 pandemic, everyone was trying to come to grips with the isolation that the lockdown imposed on almost everyone. Anxiety over the unknown was…

POEM         The raindrops were shining like stars On the grass.   Fallen from the sky They lay quiet, evanescent.   There they were Stars we don’t see during the day.   Unseen but ever-present As I…

POEM         I close my eyes And I see a world As big and as wide As no eyes can embrace.   I close my eyes And I see a void From where all things Can be.…

POEM   Sometimes, when the timing is right The taho man passes by my gate Just as I am outside Sweeping yesterday’s dead leaves away.   Sometimes, when he passes by my gate I have enough coins to buy a…

SOCIAL MEDIA         A day after the annual Philippine independence day which is celebrated every June 12, my Facebook newsfeed showed posts like this. Following the hashtags reveal a campaign launched and spearheaded by Mega Magazine, a…

POEM/PAINTING         Where do we come from… Where do I come from The womb of the mother Shaped from the past From the ancestors of my ancestors From living cells Incubated in the oceans Emerging from the…

POEM         She and I fly, intoxicated, high Lifting me up from the mire Urging me onwards There where no words can capture The rapture that erupts When you leave the past behind   She and I…

POEM         Let us build a living space Amidst the barbed wire and rusting fences. Here, from its steel embrace Emerge from ancient sleep Dreams that survive the morning light.   Here, words interlace Spoken from the…

PERSONAL ESSAY         May 4, 1969, more than 50 years ago, Silo gave his first public speech to some few hundred people high up in the Andes Mountains near Mount Aconcagua, entitled the Healing of Suffering. It…