Dancing with the crocodiles

By Virginia Jasmin Pasalo

HE approaches and she raises her head, then they tenderly kiss, and he rubs her head with his chin, smearing her with his scent, dips underneath and rubs her throat, breathing heavily. He rotates her legs on one side, extruding his penis, as they both perform an elaborate dance in the water. The water joins the dance as both flutter in the river. They mate over a few days, until another interrupts and displays dominance, a water dance display on his back, and gets what he wants. Sometimes, he does not go through this ritual, he just takes what he wants. This is the behaviour of crocodiles in mating, as well as in exercising power, much like humans.

Some people are crocodiles, some worse than crocodiles. A crocodile dances to mate, but a human crocodile dances everywhere and anywhere for economic gain. He gets his orgasm from the cry of forests being raped and gets a hard on among the debris of felled trees in the highways. He dances on top of benches made from tree stumps still reeling to find their trunk. He defecates on the sacred. He takes control, wherever he goes, fucks you in your own house, and having sucked you of blood, he stays to bleed you dry and makes you say, “Thank you!”

SAYAW ED TAPEW NA BANGKO

(ya nanlapu’d abetang ya narra tan akasya)

Unsasayaw ira’y buwaya
Maawang lay kalsada
Abetang lan amin su akasya

Dakel manaya’y bitewen
Ed ambilunget ya tawen
natan nanengneng da la
su aroan ta
ya inyamot nen saman 
na sanga
tan bolong na narra

Unsasayaw ira’y buwaya
Maawang lay kalsada
Abetang lan amin su akasya

iner kasi man-aroan 
may duaran pipit
ya apildit 
ed Paldit?

DANCE ON TOP OF THE BENCH

(that came from the axed narra and acacia trees)

The roads are wider now

for a crocodile dance
the rain trees have fallen

there are so many stars
in the dark sky

we can no longer hide from the stars
our lust,
once hidden by the branches
and the leaves of the narra trees

The roads are wider now
for a crocodile dance
all rain trees have fallen

where will the two pipits
stranded in Paldit
make love?

 

NOTES: Sayaw ed tapew na bangko is a joyful Pangasinan dance characterized by fast movements on top of a steep wooden bench. A pipit is a bird. Paldit is a municipality in Sison, Pangasinan, in the 5th district.

The 5th district is comprised of 8 municipalities, including Sison, Pozorrubio, Binalonan, Villasis and the city of Urdaneta located along the Manila North Road (MNR) where 1059 century-old trees had been massacred in 2013 and where, today, the remaining 700 trees are mercilessly being axed to death.

(For your comments and reactions, please email to: punch.sunday@gmail.com)

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