POUR FOuRTH THIS TALE! By Jing Villamil   SHE called. She, who lived through Covid19, but whose husband did not. She, who dreams of him still. Through the screen, we touched fives. At once, with no prod – tears, streams poured forth from her. Mine eyes, I closed; but lids…

The Third Tale! (A monosyllabic prosepoem) By Jing Villamil   SHE dreams of him still. How could she not? In her dream, she was there, when he shrugged off his cage of bones and thin flesh and tired black-blue veins. She dreamed she was there when they tore out the…

A talk with a vamp! (A monosyllabic prose poem) By  Jing Villamil   HERE I am, back to this place I left, this swath of land that thought it had lost me. It has not! My clan had sprung from here, too. One does not let go of home, though…

Lull a bye! By Jing Villamil   MORE than thirty Filipino seafarers remain missing in chilly waters off southwestern Japan after their Panamanian cargo ship capsized amidst the onslaught of Typhoon Maysak the first week of September. Truthfully, there is no getting over the faces of anxiety, anger, grief. The…

So grand! By Jing Villamil   THEY were the new-born, the toddler, the pre-school, grader and high school student, the binatilyo and dalagita, the binata and dalaga, the proud groom and the blushing bride, the mother nursing, caring for and teaching her child, the father off to the daily grind….

Gone for a walk! By Jing Villamil   THIS story was a whisper, told loudly above engine roars. Once upon a summertime, once upon my island. It was told by cousins, doubling as backseat drivers, while I was battling the narrow unpaved road hugging the island’s many bends, the mountain…

A COVID tale too By Jing Villamil   HE is a seafarer. The sea is on his sunburnt skin, and in layers underneath. Even his clothes smell of salt and sand trapped in the stitches, pockets, folds. But wherever part of the world his ship anchored, his heart and his…

 A COVID Tale By Jing Villamil   THE first time ever that their lives touched base, was at the hospital parking lot which, at the time, was chokingly full. One had to ease sideways through narrow space between cars. Two bodies easing sideways through same narrow space was a feat…

Look up, look back! By Jing Villamil   HE looked up from his stay-home work. He rubbed his eyes. He gazed out far to the greens. And his sight flipped back to the past. For, where does one go when the present is pandemic, the future pandemonium? In these times…

So Tree-Less a monosyllabic prose poem ( 1 word/1 beat) By Jing Villamil   YOU were the tree from which we sprang! Your roots clutched, held and fixed us on firm ground; strange, for you rose from sand! You reached out high and wide your leaves to seek the sun….